1967: Sword of Israel, scenario Sixteen: West of Jebel Libni

Jumping back into 1967 I picked out three scenarios from my play list and this was first. Nice mix of units and interesting terrain to fight through. The Egyptians just have to hold up the Israelis from exiting and eliminate five steps while the Israeli player has to exit 32 units. I assume a unit is two whole steps or two half steps? Anyway I figured that out later.

The Israeli player advanced across the maps with all their units as they have only ten turns to navigate all this terrain, enemy dug-in units, wire and mines but with help from their air-force on the first two turns. This was a pretty costly fight and the Israeli player had those strong Cent5 armor units but has a lot of weaker units as well. They lost more steps than I am use too and lost 17 steps, mostly the weaker AMX13s, Halftracks, one Engineer step and a lucky T-54 shot took out a Cent5 step, one of the few I have lost to date. So the Egyptian play achieved one of their victory conditions but by the later turns were in a very poor shape to do anything with few remaining units that were functional and had lost 38 steps. So the Israeli player exited 34 units or 68 steps not counting jeeps and leaders.

The game ended in a Draw, as both sides achieved their victory conditions, in one of the bloodier scenarios. I haven’t played 1967 for a while so it was enjoyable.

This scenario balances the victory conditions (VC): the Egyptians (EG) win by eliminating five Israeli (IS) tank steps, while the IS win by exiting 32 (out of 46) units off the opposite board edge in this one map game. The terrain is unusual in that a belt of wadis stretches along the width of board on its western half, where the IS have to exit. This allows the EG to shelter unseen and avoid a long range confrontation with the IS supermen (their entire army is efficient, and has superior weapons and leadership). Playing solitaire, I pretty much messed things up for both sides. I did not grasp the importance of the road leading from the eastern edge to the western until well into the game. Thus, the EG neglected to pile it on in that sector. For the IS, I kept the vulnerable AMX-13's in the front line, with dire consequences for the step loss tally. The EG popped out of the wadis when they went last on about game turn five, when the IS armor had closed. Even though they lost the initiative the next turn, enough of their armor survived to savage the AMX-13's and take out a step or two of M51 Super Shermans as well. There it was: six steps lost. That was it though for the EG armor. None survived into the next game turn. This left just the scattered and poorly supported EG infantry to contest IS board exit. It was not a fair fight.