Late in the afternoon of May 15, 1940, the fighting continued around Gembloux, Belgium. Units from the 1re Division Marocaine were engaged by elements of the 35th Panzer Regiment and 12th & 35th Schutzen Regiments. The Moroccan troops formed a strong line in north and central Gembloux with the Germans pressing on both fronts. After the slow advance earlier in the day, the Germans held the sunken railroad section, with troops positioned south along the west side of the railroad tracks and in the woods north of the city. By 1645, two German infantry platoons had broken through the south end of the line into Gembloux despite strafing from a French Am.143. After German OBA destroyed a 25mm AT group in northwest Gembloux at 1730 hours, two Panzer platoons broke through in the north and circled to the west side of the town. They were finally tracked down and eliminated by a combined R35/ tirailleur ESC group at 1830 hours. Fighting continued both north and south of the town into the evening hours with no resolution. Even though the Germans were compromised, they managed to hold some positions west of the railroad, a situation that resulted in a German victory.

This scenario is essentially a continuation of the battle fought on that same day in Scenario #18 (cf. previous AAR from that battle). It was remarkable that the Axis units from the previous AAR held almost the same ground on which they finished in that play. The red Division Marocaine ESC units were used in place of French infantry, so that this could be played as a Division Marocaine scenario. The only objective in this scenario is to not allow any undemoralized German units to remain west of the railroad by scenario end. This can be difficult since the Germans must be pushed back from their starting positons north of the town, while not allowing any advance from units east of the railroad. With panzer units that have 8 movement points, there is excellent mobility for the German armor once it has crossed the tracks. That fact coupled with the difficulty in scoring hits on armor makes for a very difficult French victory option. In fact, I would have scored the scenario higher if there had been a more realistic victory condition. In the final analysis, the Germans had the following units still west of the railroad at game end: one full strength HMG, five reduced infantry (1 good order, 2 disrupted, and 2 demoralized), one reduced engineer (disrupted), and two reduced panzer units (both disrupted). The French had lost 19 steps to 37 lost for the Germans (tanks counting double).

Author	treadasaurusrex (Morocco)
Method	VASSAL
Victor	France, Morocco
Participants	unknown
Play Date	2022-01-06
Language	English
Scenario	DiMa002

This 3-session play-through was online and I once again played the Moroccan side. The resulting play was different from the previous play-through, as we played the entire scenario to the bitter end. It did result in a victory for the hard-fighting, French Moroccan troops.

Having already played this scenario in another guise, it was significantly easier for both sides to manage troop movements, and attack sequencing this time around, with much less, tedious rule-checking and interpreting necessary.

Please see my AAR for 1940: Fall of France, Scenario 21, and I respectfully refer the reader to blackcloud6's succinct & insightful AAR for this scenario as well, in which he discussed the multiple deficiencies in this, not-thoroughly-play-tested scenario.