Panzer Grenadier Battles on March 28th:
Spearhead Division #15 - Dillenberg
A vicious struggle from start to finish
Author Brett Nicholson
Method Solo
Victor Soviet Union
Play Date 2014-01-15
Language English
Scenario EFDx011

In this scenario the Romanian 6th Guard Infantry Regiment is given the ardous task of holding on to 4 town hexes on the southeastern map; not only controlling the town but keeping any Soviet units from occupying it. Also, they have to keep the bridge area on the Northeastern map clear of Soviet units within a 4 hex radius. Not only that, but they have to keep their losses down to less than 12 steps to prevent a Soviet victory.

In the cover of darkness the Soviets split their forces into two groups; The 5th Calvary, supported with some infantry attack in the north, by the bridge and most of the other foot units attack the town in the south with a mix of T-26 and T-37 tanks. The Romanians by the bridge have dug-in in a half circle spaced apart by 1-2 hexes, 4 hexes out with 3 x 47mm AT guns evenly dispersed amongst the INF and HMG units. The rest of the Romanian units occupy the town.

The northern Soviet attack gets off to disasterous start when the calvary is sent in first to charge dug-in postions and soon enough, with little or any gain, 2 of the 3 calvary leaders are gone; one eliminated and one deserting. The third calvary leader, a Lieutenant with a mere 6-0-0 rating, remained either demoralized or disrupted most of the battle until just about dawn before he recovered back to good order. This left a lot of the remaining calvary units leaderless for quite some time, scattered around in the darkness. The other two regular leaders refused to break off from their flank attack to lead or assist those calvary units as they were having to keep rallying their own units to press on the main bridgehead attack. This worked out well enough as the calvary would be held in reserve until they were needed the most.

The Soviet assault on the town went much better during the night phase. Romanian units took most of the early step losses there and the Soviets were able to keep one urban assault going for quite a few hours. The nighttime (-1) direct and indirect fire modifiers favored the attackers and kept Soviet casualties down. The Soviet tanks split up; the T-26s moved around the town and tried to sneak their way in towards the bridgehead while the T-37s remained outside the town to mow down any demoralized, fleeing units. The T-26s don't make it too far before they are wiped out by a swarm of INF but they succeeded in dividing the enemy's forces up which were already spread dangerously thin.

The battle rages on for hours and both sides are locked in a stalemate until dawn. The Romanians are holding out in both areas and able to keep losses down. Eventually the Soviets get pushed out of the town from a counterattack and the attacking forces by the bridgehead have been pushed back into retreat. For a shortwhile it looks like the Guards will be able to hang on and at least end this battle in draw. As soon as visibilty increased past 2 hexes with the morning light the tide finally turned in favor of the Soviets. On board and off board artillery begins to tear apart Romanian dug-in postions in the north and the calvary, now reformed and regrouped makes more successful charges. The dug-in Romanian lines are breached while some straggling INF units that had fled the town assault earlier have regrouped and approach the bridge area from the south. By 07:00/turn 29, the Soviets have inflicted the required 12 Romanian step losses and now look to just hold back maintaining a presence within 4 hexes of the bridge to keep their victory.

The remaining Romanian guards do all they can to push the Soviets back again but their fighting strength has been severely reduced and are now too far spread out to keep all bases covered. By the end of the battle, after 36 turns, the Soviets have 5 steps of INF within the 4 hex radius of the bridge and win this deathmatch. It was not an easy victory and the Romanian 6th Guards Regiment put up a fierce resistance. They could at least boast that they drove the horde of Bolsheviks out of the town when outnumbered there at least 2-1 and won one of the two battles going on; unfortunately they needed to win both of the battles and the bridge was also of far more strategical value. This was a nice challenge for a solo play and as such, rated a '4' as it was a real cliffhanger. In a shared play, a better Romanian strategy may be to choose just one of two areas to defend but that would be likely pushing for a draw. Even then, it will be hard to keep step losses down to less than 12, especially once dawn breaks and full visibility is gained.

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