FireForce

The Horror of Guerrilla Warfare in Rhodesia

Rhodesia vs Mozambique

January - March 1978

3 Commando, Rhodesian Light Infantry

On November 11, 1965, Rhodesian Prime Minister Ian Smith unilaterally declared the country independent from British rule. Over the next fifteen years, an armed resistance campaign by several liberation groups, Marxist-socialist in nature, grew steadily until the entire country was embroiled in a brutal "Bush War".

FireForce, a method of combat developed by the Rhodesians and perfected by the Rhodesian Light Infantry, involved troops being helicoptered or parachuted into an area immediately after a guerrilla sighting had been detected. The combat strain on an individual soldier was almost unbelievable, for the Rhodesians, who were always desperately short of ground troops to deal with guerrilla incursions, sometimes parachuted the same men into as many as three contacts a day.

Please keep in mind that although the situation is authentic, the individual scenarios are fictional. Most fireforce contacts involved a tiny number of troops and are not well suited for gaming with Steel Panthers. The chosen scenarios are meant to represent the major actions that a unit might see while the minor actions are left unplayed. The intent of the campaign is to give the player a highly-trained, elite force to experiment with the tactics and techniques of the fireforce concept.

Gameplay Notes:

1. The player is given a reinforced company consisting of two platoons of parachute infantry, one platoon of heliborne infantry, and a supporting heavy weapons platoon.

2. Few support points are generally available in individual battles. Often, Rhodesian Air Force spotter planes and K-Car light support aircraft will loiter in the area to provide direct support.

3. The enemy consists mainly of poorly equipped, highly motivated light guerrillas. Expect a few surprises as the campaign progresses.

4. Use the weapons platoon to suppress enemy infantry while manuevering the regular infantry platoons in for the kill. This campaign is a good place to learn basic infantry tactics.

5. Enemy artillery is rare but extremely devastating to infantry in the open.

6. Rebuild points will be few. Be very careful not to incur unacceptable losses.

Sources and extra information:

FireForce by Chris Cocks.

Mukiwa: A White Boy in Africa by Peter Godwin.

SPMBT ver 2.01 Campaign

Complexity: Medium

Unit Types: Company level

Fixed Force

Rhodesia is the human player.

Campaign Design:Travis Hilterbrand (travis_hilterbrand@yahoo.com)

SPMBT v2 plus the "v2 supplement" must be installed!