Atheory's Project: Operation Fischreiher (Stalingrad42)

[Plain Ian]

5% to complete - I am having issues confirming and locating the positions of the following Russian units that may have been involved during the scenario (july 23 to sep 2)
37th Gds Rifle Division
98th Rifle Division
126th Rifle Division
131st Rifle Division
157th Rifle Division
204th Rifle Division
2nd Tank Corps (w/ 26, 27 and 99th tank bde)
158th Tank Bde
20th Motorized Bde
38th Motorized Bde
10th Rifle Bde
42nd Rifle Bde


If anyone has information on these units and cares to pass it along, would be most appreciative. Otherwise, someone in the future can take and complete the scenario :)

You don't mention what sources you've checked or used. 

Have you looked at the on line maps on the rkkaw2.armchairgeneral.com site. I had a quick glance and can see the 157th Rifle Div in 51A on the map 28/6 -23/7. 

Books. I assume you have Glantz's trilogy? This is a pretty comprehensive epic which covers the 42 campaign. Its a bit dry and the maps are supposed to be pretty awful but if a unit was there I'm sure he will mention it.  

I do not have Glantz I'm afraid. My books go way back to the 70's. I have Enemy at the Gates by David Craig and the Secret of Stalingrad by Walter Kerr. Both published 1972. 

Kerr's book does not have any situational maps but it does have an interesting Appendix which list dates for when units were assigned to Stalingrad Commanders.

131st on or before 16th July (in Reserve)
157th on or before 16th July (51A)
204th July 26
126th July 28
98th Aug 4
37th Gds Aug 16

In the book I think the 99 Tk Bde/2ndTank Corps is mentioned? I'll check.
 
Sorry but these just give you a rough idea of when they appear but not where they were during the period you mention. (apart from the 157th) 

What about boardgames? I have Campaign to Stalingrad by Mark Simonitch and his OOB is supposed to be pretty good. Again it only gives you a rough idea of when they appear but all of the Rifle Divisions and the 38th Rifle Bde are listed. There is a boardgame called Case Blue by MMP which probably has a more detailed and up to date OOB/OOA since Campaign to Stal came out in 1992.

Let me know if you want copies of anything.

[Ocito80]

@Plain Ian

I appreciate the info. My sources have been generally limited to what I can find online. I've not invested, yet, in other sources such as glant's books yet.

I've not seen those maps from armchairgeneral. I will take a look.

Even if I don't have the exact location, as long as I get an idea (date) of when they arrived on the battlefield, I can place them through an educated guess.


Again, most appreciative.

[Ocito80]

I've adjusted my list by taking out the units I've been able to place on the map. Below is what remains:

158th Tank Bde
38th Motorized Bde
42nd Rifle Bde


With that said, the scenario files have been updated. The scenario is deemed ready to go at 99.8%.

[ComradeP]

Thanks for the hard work and the quick replies.

I started copying the Italian unit boxes from the Gold version of Kharkov '42 (I don't own the title, but figured the new unit boxes would be in the update) yesterday, but you beat me to it.

Regarding the bridges: Understood, I thought the current situation may not have been as intended. The Soviets can manually wire the full hex bridges if they have the engineers to do so, which should force the Axis to make some difficult decisions regarding their deployment.

[Plain Ian]

The scenario is 400 turns. Thereby representing the 40 days of grueling combat of Army Group B advancing towards the city, and the Russians fanatical and desperate attempts to stop them. The object isn't the city itself, and the scenario stops just around the time many claim the battle for the city itself begins on September 2nd. As best as I can get it, this is an historical scenario. The smaller scenario with the game already, Don_Bend, was my starting point and I expanded upon it.

Key Features

3) The 4th Panzer Army, The Italian Units and the Russian 51st and 57th Armies are fixed to start the scenario. Other elements are initially fixed as well and free up over time. 

I was intrigued by the mention of Italian units so I've downloaded and looked at the scenario. I was surprised to see Italians south of Serafimovitsch but a quick google shows you are spot on.
https://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic....9&start=30
I knew that this area was secured by the Germans then allocated to the Rumanians but I didn't realise the Italians were involved to start with. 
The only problem is that in this sceario the Italians will be stuck there since I guess its hard to set up a withdrawal in the scenario?

[Ocito80]

The Italians are actually present for all of this scenarios time frame. The Soviet 21st Army, or maybe the 63rd launched a counter-attack in the area mid to late August and the Italians were fighting hard until the end of August. Italian reinforcements and german support were just enough to stop and contain the attacks.

I don't think the Romanian 3rd army began arriving in the area until mid September. Which allowed the exhausted Italians to consolidate themselves further west along the Don. It was the Commander of the 3rd Romanian Army who requested permission to remove the Russian bridgehead, but was denied.

As we know, this bridgehead will later be a major staging and launch point for the Russians in Operation Uranus.

[Plain Ian]

I've adjusted my list by taking out the units I've been able to place on the map. Below is what remains:

158th Tank Bde
38th Motorized Bde
42nd Rifle Bde


With that said, the scenario files have been updated. The scenario is deemed ready to go at 99.8%.

38th Motorised Infantry Bde

The boardgame Camapign to Stalingrad has this unit as a reinforcement turn Nov 13th -15th. 

However my photocopied maps of a book by Chuikov ("How I won the war or something like that.....) shows the unit 13th September fighting in Stalingrad just west of the Krasny Oktyabar Settlement. 

However when I look at the rkkaww2 site map S4218 (situation Aug 8th - 10th) might be showing the 38th MIB just behind the 38th Rifle Division? I'm guessing that this is the Russian for MIB?

[Ocito80]

Excellent, I'll take a look and see if I can narrow its arrival a bit more. To say the least, looks like we at least got a confirmed time frame to work with.

I'll update this by the weekend as I'm knee deep in a couple projects.

On-going projects
1) Operation Rumyantsev (or the 4th Battle of Kharkov) Aug 3 to Aug 23 (hoping to have this puppy ready for whenever Kharkov"43 gold is released. Why K43, the map is better than k42 for covering this Russian Offensive. (high priority)

2) Calais_44_Gold (reworking oob and unit placement due to the availability of new information. hope to have ready whenever France'40 gold is released (low priority)

3) Smolensk'43 - striving to finish the axis oob and then begin unit placement on the map. Still planning to have this ready by the end of the month = January (moderate priority)

Thanks for the info

[ComradeP]

Plain Ian: That is indeed the 38th motorized rifle brigade.

The Soviets abbreviated brigade as "br" (in Cyrillic, obviously) as "b" was already taken by battalion contrary to the confusing NATO standard where the "B" can mean both battalion and brigade.

Unit names/abbreviations on Soviet maps also tend to be in italic script, which means some Cyrillic letters do not match their upright forms. This can be confusing until you get used to it.

-

I'll give the campaign a go when the motorized brigade has been added.

After looking at the map and OOB a few times, I'm very worried about the life expectancy of all those company-sized Soviet battalions, but we'll see how long they last.

[Ocito80]

The strength numbers were a carry over from the actual S42 game itself. I've not adapted them at all. If anything, most should be a tad weaker since fighting has been relatively continuous since June 28-ish when Case Blue started. There is also no heavy weapons company represented throughout the scenario. This is something I hope to change in my scenarios as I'm theory crafting a new concept for the HW Company unit within the battalion structure.

As I work to "streamline" the unit strengths and values throughout all my scenarios, it is possible this can change in time. Especially, after any reasonable amount of testing and or feed back. But, for now the scenario will remain without a HW company.

*Teaser*
My HW Company concept
1) Treated as support unit rather than assault type unit. (meaning it has very low assault values)
2) HW Company is split into 2 over-strength size platoon units (50-80men). Why 2 and not 3? Many HW comp up to 1943/44 were 2 machine and 1 mortar platoons, (some nations are different). I would merge the mortar manpower and firepower potential into 2 MG platoons. It's a more abstract use of the units capabilities with (i hope) bringing to the front the real spirit of the HW company.

The purpose of this configuration....
1) It adds back to the battalion some manpower removed when many scenarios began removing the HW unit altogether.
2) It adds back some firepower as well.
3) It is not strong enough to treat as a full combat unit, but can merge the two units for added flexibility.
4) Not weak enough to perish too easily, but just weak enough to force consideration of how the unit is used.
5) It gives the Regiment/Battalion additional units from which to apply some of the following historical tactics:
a) Increase defensive frontage of the Regiment (if needed)
b) Add additional firepower to other units in the same hex (think: MG platoon being assigned to support another unit)
c) Rear area protection. Protection units that can help protect artillery/HQ unit locations.
d) Maintain original attack lines in case offensive units need to retreat.
e) Inject unit in line while main combat unit is in rear resting/recovering.

The hiccups come from nations that have two mortar platoons and only one MG platoon. Then later in the war, throw in an AT platoon just to mess with me I think...(haha). For simplicity and continuity, I think I've settled on having just 2 HW type units, period. A MG-Mortar variant, and an MG-AT variant. The attack/defense values will adjust accordingly.

Concerns
1) I question how a Russian OOB can handle this, as most scenarios don't break the battalions down into companies. I was just thinking of adding the manpower back to the battalion regardless, to offset what would be given to the Axis.

Anywho, that's what I got so far