Reflections. 1946 USSR campaign
Just finished the fourth battle, moving my current campaign to 1947.
With that, I wanted to note a few observations.
My force is 3 companies of infantry in trucks, 1 company of tanks, with each company getting extra 4 snipers, a 3 MG unit and 3 anti tank teams in jeeps.
Artillery is a battery of medium guns, plus the mortar section from the battalion weapon company.
A few reflections on the units available:
Infantry - One section in each platoon has 2 RP46, giving 4 LMG per platoon, which isn't bad. I didn't want to be too cheezy and load up every squad that way, but they held their own well against French and Brit infantry, and outshot the Yanks rather well (at a distance anyway)
I didn't try SMG infantry, though in hindsight, I would probably make one of the companies an "assault" company.
Each platoon includes an anti tank team with RPG6 grenades. These guys are pretty versatile. Though knocking out a Centurion can be dicey, they work great against Shermans, and they seem to be able to often avoid detection as they move up.
Machine guns
Each company has 3 SGM's, and I added a second section to each company for some extra firepower. Im in the process of upgrading them to DSHK's, which is one of my favourite weapons for infantry support.
Nothing to spectacular here. I am trying to keep them much more concentrated than I usually do, which means some pretty intense suppressive fire as the infantry moves in to assault.
Trucks
I've gotten better at utilizing trucks. During a meeting engagement, the infantry dismounts just behind a terrain feature, then take up positions on foot. Rather than head straight for the objective, sometimes it's better to dig in and turn the encounter into a defensive engagement.
Tanks
Emulating the cold war motorized rifle system of assigning a tank company to each motor rifle battalion, which in turn get parcelled out 1 platoon to each company.
I've been trying using them in rather close support of the infantry, as well as using the soviet doctrine of the platoon either firing or moving.
I started out with the cheapest stuff available, T34/76's, which were rather outdated. As they got blown up, they've been upgraded to T34/85 (pretty competitive) and T44 (quite an impressive vehicle. Competitive against the dreaded Centurion and easily a Sherman beater). Now that we've moved to 47, a few T54-1 have shown up, and we're eager to test this new design.
Sniper
As mentioned, each company has 4 snipers providing suppressing fire. These have been invaluable in harassing and limiting enemy movement. In one battle, they formed an early ambush point with overlapping fields of fire after a belt of mines. Anti tank teams with RPG6 grenades provided tank ambush capability.
Overall, the Soviet warmachine is a quite capable beast, and we've come out of our struggles with the capitalist forces very well, though tank casualties have been rather high.
With many elements now veteran, and new tanks rolling off the production line, the world revolution will surely be victorious.
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