"Come back here ya coward, it's only a flesh wound..." SFS Round 2 Sitrep Thread!!

[Dogovich]

Dogowitz crawled out from the turret of his destroyed tank his senses dazed by the effects of the enemy round that had stuck them. The blast had been so powerful that his Panzer III command tank had been knocked over onto its side. Still feeling light headed, the Oberst crawled through the tall steppe grass trying desperately to get away from his burning vehicle before the flames reached the ammunition. Suddenly, the earth began to shake. Looking to his left Dogowitz beheld a monster green shape the size of a small house coming straight for him. He tried getting up and running, but before he could get very far he tripped over a dead tree limb and fell to the ground. Before he could get up, the steel beast was upon him and he was sudden immersed in shadows as the tank drove right over him crushing his two legs beneath its massive wide tracks. Screaming in agony, Dogowitz struggled to remain conscious. But before he knew it, rough hands had grabbed him by the arms and were pulling him up off the ground. Gutteral voices were crying his name, but all that the barbaric thugs would get from him was his name, rank, and .... and... damn! What else was he suppose to tell them? Mein Gott! My legs!

.......Sir! Herr Oberst! Wake up! You are yelling in your sleep!"

Dogowitz suddenly awoke. Looking frantically about him he was surprised to see the familiar surroundings of his command tent. His young adjutant, LT Fritz stood worried by his side. Dogowitz checked his legs and was relieved that he still had them. "Lord! What a night!" he exclaimed.

"Was it another nightmare Herr Oberst?" asked the concerned young officer.
"Ja... dem Russ Panzers were attacking us again." The Oberst listened carefully to the sounds of the night. All that could be heard were the sounds of continuous celebration from the camp of the Red Hordes. "Still at it I see."
"Ja mein Herr. Those Slavs know how to party."
"Let us pray they don't know too much about fighting. I'm okay now. Go back to bed."

Only seven more days left to go. Damn that Gordonovich! If only he'd return and put an end to this cursed waiting.

[Digger]

Blocking Action at Krupki

Comrade General Diggerovish, sits nervously in his GAZ Jeep gazing up the sealed road to Krupki. Looking resplendant in his pressed uniform and shoulderboards he cuts a contrasting figure to the scruffy looking lot surrounding his Command Post, with the exception of Col. Bogdanovich who still insists on wearing his cavalry uniform. Lucky for him the Commisar was killed in the last engagement and Gen Diggerovish decided not to mention this fact to HQ. One eager Captain who volunteered to do so, in a fit of Communist pride..well he was also killed in the last engagement...

HQ have ordered that Krupki be seized and the fascist invader be driven from the holy soil of mother Russia. General Diggerovish recalls the sweeping hand gesture made in the direction of Krupki, by his Corps commander, who didn't even appear to be looking at the map at the time. Commisar Dottski, a mindless sycophant, provided the name "Krupki".

"Yes Krupki", the Corps Commander stated, "we will smash the fascist there!"

"We could bypass them and drive into their rear" Diggerovish stated, whilst being glared at by Dottski.

"We will smash them head on" was the reply. "Drive up the road with your tanks and destroy them" he roared.

"Yes Comrade General" was the only replay he could manage, there was no point, this man was a glory seeker, determined to become a Hero of the Soviet Union, whatever the cost.

So there he sat sifting through intelligence reports, mainly from fleeing civilians, who indicated that the Germans were in Krupki in strength. Panthers, Tigers, Mark IV's, Jadgpanzers, Infantry, artillery and AA guns, were to be expected. He gazed wearily at the aerial photo taken yesterday...."Smash them head on" wasn't ringing too well in the Generals' ears.

He looked out at the young dirt stained faces of his tankers, he knew very few of these men, so many had died, so many had replaced them. Standing up in his GAZ he delivered his customary pre-battle speech.

"Comrades, today we do battle with the enemy, those that will die are heros, those that will live are heros, so fight well and you will become a hero" For some reason it always seemed to work.

With a final hurrah, his men climbed up into their tanks and the sound of roaring diesal engines and the smell of smoke filled the air. General Diggerovish gazed at the tanks before him, T-34's both old and new and the new Capitalist M-4's, were these enough to conquer the enemy, where was the infantry..."No time for infantry", the Corps Commander had said, "we must strike now". With these thoughts buzzing through his mind he ordered the tanks forward..




Fortunately Diggerovishs' unit has the honour of leading the attack.

[Digger]

Blocking Action at Krupki Turn 1

Comrade General Diggerovishs', mobile command post followed his tanks closely as the first M-4's edged out of sight and around the bend in the road..Immediately there was a sharp crack, followed by a dull richocheting sound..The radio was filled with panicked cries, we are hit, we are hit, 88mm up ahead, The battery had stopped the M-4s in their tracks forcing the crews to button up..He had expected immediately to hear the sound of expoding tanks, but there was silence. The battery had fired at once..Inexperience.."Quick" General Diggerovish ordered "before they reload".

More M-4's Rolled into view, firing round after round into the offending battery, two guns went up in smoke, shattered by high explosive rounds, finally an M17 followed to unleash four barrels of death at the remaining guns..another gun crew wiped out, only one gun remained..the remaining tanks were too far back to engage.

"Get the infantry forward" he yelled into his radio, "I want that gun destroyed in the next 6 minutes"....As the Riflemen advanced cautiously into the wheatfield, in full sight of the remaining 88mm.

These Capitalist tanks were not so bad he thought, better than the junk the British had sent last year.The additional armour plates he had insisted on bolting on had already proved their worth, and the gun looked nice.

The radio cracked with static, "shall we advance elsewhere Comrade General", it was Bogdanovich.

"Continue the attack"...he ordered..and went back to look at his map..

[Scorched Earth]

Allied turn three: Scorched Earth Vs Wolfman:

Ok, if i have told them a 1,000 times before, check the brakes before u move, but no, talking to the Pavlova's is like to talking to a half baked cake. So, what happens, the HQ rolls forward just a little bit too much, and it gets shot up by a waiting Germanski platoon (must have had the granpappy of Klose in that platoon - damn fine shot - at range too) who had the nerve to hide right in front of our armour, the sheer cheek of it. Anyway, the Bratwurst twiddler paid the price, as did the berzerk HT anti air Quad that stuck it's nose into someone else's business. Before u know we hit mines, land mines, not that we run into them - a lucky escape for the sons of Russische, but it got the troops thinking land mine, well in backwoods Russiche, that translates as Mine Land (which i know sounds like bad German - and they are bad u know)., so, as it's mine Land, get off, retire, retreat, go back to Berlinski. That's when the 88, opens up, and the shells bounce off, the tank crew go wild as their lucky charm of coating themselves in pig swill has worked again, still, would not want to be in that tank on a hot summers day....

[majog]

[Scorched Earth]

Allied turn 4 Scorched Earth vs Wolfman:

I was saying the other day to Pavlova, u really should go on a map reading course. He says to me, but dont u feel u are being directed by some higher, slightly sweaty hand. Do u mean God? i asked. No, says he, & dont spring any of those awful waiting for "God"ot jokes on me. Back to the matter at hand, were lost in the woods, what i thought was a clear path to victory turns out to be a dead end covered in poison ivy (i just knew i could get a Batman reference in here someday). Ambushes at every turn by lurking Panthers & PIV's (thingies with long barrels), still we got the better of them this time around. That was when we saw the massed Tiggers, boinging around (as they do), we decided the woods looked nicer in the other direction. Our rockets made it look like the 4th of July when we took out some more 88's, (i must get my ears syringed of sand), i meant Vladivostock Day. It's only a matter of time before some serious fighting breaks out here :-)

[Oberst]

[size=medium][i] Sitrep: Turns 4 & 5:

Axis arty finally makes it appearance with mixed results. Casualties are suffered amogst the Rifle plts and engineers but not as bad as it could have been. Our arty taks out another sp of an ATG plt. Unfortunately a truck plt also gets caught in the Axis barrage. Inf units begin to probe the Axis defenses in the factory complex and an mg plt as well as an engineer plt are discovered. We take some casualties but hang tough in the debris to spot for our arty and are rewarded with direct hits from our spendid Katushya batteries and 122 mm arty. Smoke laid to the South hides the LOS of the Panther plt and our armored units rush forward to assault the mg unit first which retreats to the engineers sector. Several HT's are also destroyed by direct fire. With a final Urra! we assault the disrupted Axis units and in short order the factory complex is rid of the Axis defenders. To the East and NE of Krupki we continue to feel our way forward sniping with enemy Panther units. We suffer a few more inf losses but manage to take out 2 sp of Tigers as well as 1 Panther sp. The next turn will see some major action for sure.

Oberst

[Scorched Earth]

Allied Turn 5: Scorched Earth Vs Wolfman:

Firstly, kudo's to Rick for bottling me up on all the approaches - i feel like a fizzy Budweiser ready to go.....

Allied forces trundle forward & keep finding pesky axis infantry lying in ambush - do they have nothing better to do - cant they see i'm trying to advance here?

Allied forces open heavy fire on various units in the centre & South of the map - with little result in the centre. Compared to the other posts i'm reading, my guys are performing real bad. Surely these other posts are the works of total fiction?

Allied forces push forward in the South & knock out several Panthers for no loss and some weird looking HT AA unit - not sure what it was - have to brush up on my vehicle recognition. C is for Car, T is for Tiger Tank.....

Axis losses are currently slightly greater than the Allies, but we are no-where close to any objectives....., surprise..., were behind you. :-). Well u cant blame me for trying....

[Herr Straße Laufer]

[Rasputin]

SITREP Turns 3-4....somewhere IVO Krupki
Rasputin-v-Ed

.....I am going to have to give a bit of wall-to-wall counseling to a certain inexperienced tank gunner and 88mm crew....or at least I would had they not stupidly opened fire too soon and got themselves blown apart for nothing.....between that and having to duck incoming rockets and artillery randomly splashing about the landscape these damn reds are starting to really hack me off. My intel chief creeps into position by the mapboard after frantically trying to keep up with the radio traffic......

....wave....wave.....

"Sir....further heavy ruski probes in the north and center are coming in. To the north of Krupki one of our heavy tank units broke cover and fired on an advancing infantry unit. In the ensuing exchange of fire with previously concealed allied armor another pair of Tigers was blown apart from across the valley. The surviving radio operator mentioned the cannon sounded different from the usual...indicating a new type of tank has been deployed......at least another attempt to turn the northern flank was identified and pushed back...but Ivan appears to have elements of two tank companies pushing forward on the other side of the valley.....light artillery fire and Stalin Organs reported also firing in the area to little effect....."

Damn that idiot gunner for blowing the ambush early....and getting his tank and wingman killed. Still...the northern flank remains relatively secure and I don't think Herr "Akula" is going to enjoy crossing that valley.....

...wave....smoke ring....wave....

"In the center sector due east of the factory complex an 88mm battery opened fire on a red penal engineer unit that is being forced to clear mines from the road network. After revealing it's position the gun and crew were obliterated by massed and repeated tank cannon fire. A taunting message was recieved over the open radio net inviting us to "come out and play"......"

Heh heh....and we played alright. Sending forward a Jagdpanzer supported by heavy tanks my big cats managed to blast a red tank platoon clear off the planet and forced another to maneuver out of sight. A third soviet tank unit was left disrupted. This levels the playing field a bit more and some judicious artillery fire mixed with smoke should give Ivan more problems approaching the center. One of my forward infantry teams also managed to force the penal engineers off the road and into cover. I am not pleased with that 88mm opening fire early...if the gun commander had not been blown to atoms I would have had him shot.....IDIOT!

...wave...wave....

"...errr...reports from the areas south east of Krupki indicate the presence of at least 2 more platoons of red tanks lurking in the woods before contact was broken....no further activity observed....."

This sitting around waiting on Ivan is tough being an offensive-minded commander. Still....trading long distance fire benefits my side as I only need to hold for a short while...I hope! I know Herr "Akula" will soon have to commit to the attack-it is just a question of where will the shove come from and will I be able to hold in place against the onslaught or will a space-for-time tradeoff need to happen. Perhaps a little probe in force south of Krupki might place Herr "Akula" off balance...or perhaps not.....in the meantime I need to consult with my artillery chief to plot some H&I fire along Ivan's lines of approach.....

Rasputin out