Peter Robbin's "Ghost" answer from last issue has been reclassified from Most Secret to Highly Interesting, so we will start with it.

Peter Robbins

I know who your "ghost" in TEN #10 is: It's Lord Haw-Haw, or William Joyce, the fascist propagandist whose radio broadcasts from Berlin amused the British. He was actually born in Brooklyn, but was English by parentage. This resulted in his becoming a real ghost in 1946, when he was hanged by the British as a traitor.

James Broshot

First the contest. The "Ghost of Europa" is a tank that never made it to Europe. It is a "Cruiser Tank AC (Australian Cruiser) 1, Sentinel." Designed and built entirely in Australia, only 66 were manufactured between August 1942 and July 1943. The AC I weighed 28 tons, had a crew of 5 and was armed with a 2pdr OQF gun and 2 Vickers .303 calibre machine guns. It is notable, besides its unique background, for having a onepiece cast hull and a power plant composed of three American Cadillac V-8 engines coupled in the form of a clover leaf. Proposed variants were the AC II (AC I built from American supplied components) and AC IV (armed with a 17pdr gun). It was the intended equipment for the Australian ist Armoured Division.

Second, a somewhat belated response to "music to play Europa by." I have always liked to play "Witl)" with Rimsky-Korsakov's "Scherazade" on the tape deck (especially when chasing around Iraq and Persia) and also excerpts from Richard Rogers' "Victory at Sea" works, like "Mediterranean Mosaic." For the Russian Front, anything by Tchaikovsky, Prokofiev's "Alexander Nevsky," and Sibelius's "Finlandia." I also have the standard collection of German marches (by Bundeswehr bands), including the famous (remember the movie "The Battle of the Bulge") "Panzerlied."

Third, back to the Australians. I found Stuart Lee's article most interesting and valuable, as he has access to sources that are hard to find in the U.S. I agree with his contention that the AIF divisions should be rated higher. After all, the Australians, like the New Zealanders and the Canadians, had a high reputation as combat troops in both World Wars. I think that they deserve a higher rating on that basis alone, as well as for having bigger divisions. I would like to point out that the MTO infantry divisions of the Second Front material have been uprated with the 51st (Highland) Infantry Division now as a 1 x 9-8 Inf XX As Stuart points out, this division was originally the second line Territorial 9th Infantry Division which absorbed the remnants of the original 51st Division (lost in France) and was redesignated. Surely some strength revisions for the AIF are in order.

My first impressions of SIF include puzzlement at the absence of the "Atlantic Wall;" concern over the U.S. OB (what about all those Tank and Tank Destroyer Groups that Shelby Stanton lists as being used as staff and administrative headquarters and not as combat units); and lastly appreciation and amazement over the efforts of the designers.

Victor Hauser

I read with interest Deen Wood's rejoinder in TEN #8's "EXchange" to John Astell's prospective badweather combat modifications. He concludes that poor weather is not the real problem, but rather that logistics and railroad engineering are. To the extent that Deen identifies logistics and railroad regauging as two areas for further refinement in the Europa rules set, I agree with him. However, I do not agree with Deen's idea that weather should have no effect on the combat capabilities of ground units.

As a veteran of many games of FitE/SE, I believe that John Astell's recent thinking on the subject provides a workable and reasonable solution to handling combat in poor weather. Here is a proposed ruling whose time has definitely arrived!

Mud weather (as found on the East Front) really does affect ground units adversely in offensive action to a greater degree than in defense. And this has little to do with reduced air power and logistics. Indeed, the reasons are strictly physical. First, the troops are soggy, dirty, and irritable, thus lowering their morale. Secondly, when one's horses, trucks, and tanks are drowning in mud, movement and support for attacks are literally replaced by the battle against Nature. This reaches its climax in the case of artillery.

All studies on the causes of casualties in combat conclude that it is the artillery which does most of the killing in battle, by far. My personal opinion is that, if anything, artillery is underrated in importance in Europa (although I'm not certain what percentage of most units' combat factor is attributable to artillery). In any case, for an offensive to succeed, one's artillery must not only be supplied, it must also be able to quickly relocate to support a friendly advance. A defensive position is not nearly so adversely affected. Thus, when the artillery is rooted (literally) in place, any offensive will quickly stall except against the most feeble resistance. Only the most well-trained and disciplined of troops have any chance of overcoming such formidable handicaps and succeeding in an offensive of any magnitude in the mud.

I am aware of only one or two big offensives even being attempted (much less successfully executed) in the Russian mud during the war. And I think that it is this fact, as much as anything else, which John is trying to address with his new proposal. As such, I might add that these effects should be less notable in urban areas, particularly those under "siege", (i.e. position warfare). So maybe small- scale battles (comparatively) for major city and fortress hexes might be exempted from the minus-two mud modifier.

The problems in snow weather differ somewhat from those of mud, but the end result is similar since the reasons are still physical. The primary degrading factor here is the numbing cold. This manifests itself in several ways, but most importantly in reduced efficiency because of the need for bulky protective clothing, as well as the greatly reduced times that troops can be exposed to the elements and be expected to move. Put more simply, one cannot count on one's troops being able to attack for very many hours each day due to the exhausting effects of extreme cold. Here again, the defensive is usually afforded greater shelter, thus greater relative advantage.

Although snow's physical effects are inherently more lifethreatening, they don't have quite the stopping power of mud on offensive mobility. Thus, a minusone combat modifier in snow weather (the above comment about position warfare applies here as well) does not seem out of line at all when compared to offensive action taking place in good weather.

As a final thought, I appreciated Deen's comments even though I didn't agree with his main conclusion, because they were thought provoking. I felt compelled to explore the rationale for John's proposal more deeply, and in the end found the effort rewarding. I am now more satisfied with John's basic proposal than I was, intuitively, at first.

Nelson Isada

How about Scorched Earth without the ants?

Gary Helmer

Regarding John Astell's ideas about negative die mods in poor weather: yes, yes, yes! With a game system and CRT that is somewhat top- heavy in favor of the attacker, this is badly needed to produce the historical lulls that occurred during these periods.

As for the idea to upgrade Finnish divisions to 8-8, another big thumbs up. I feel, as does John, that they have been sadly underrated and should also probably move as light infantry. I have yet to see a FIitE/SE game where the Soviet player, although getting his butt kicked everywhere else on the map, doesn't throw in some boys to go chew on the Finns in '41. There must have been some reason the Soviets didn't do this historically, and this may be enough to make it a less attractive proposition.

As to all the furor about the Germans now doing better with some of the rules changes in SE, well, they should! With 20/20 historical hindsight a competent German player is not going to repeat the well-known strategic blunders of this campaign, and consequently should more often than not do better in '41 than historically. I agree with John's rules about the RR engineers, etc., and suggest that the problem, if there is one, does not lie in the new rules, but rather in the victory conditions, especially in FitE.

Victory conditions that rely solely on cities taken and do take into account losses sustained bear little resemblance to military reality. Assume that through good play, perhaps some Soviet tactical mistakes, and some luck with the weather the Germans actually take Moscow in late 1941, but get their Panzer spearheads shredded in the process. German victory? According to the FitE victory conditions, yes, but what kind of shape would the Wehrmacht then be in to face the campaigning season of 1942? How long could they hold it with their best units decimated and exhausted? What price "victory"? Are any geographic objectives so important that the losses sustained in taking them are totally irrelevant?

According to the victory conditions as they stand, yes, but I think that the answer from military history in general and this campaign in particular is a resounding NO! The point of all this is that some combination of losses and geographic objectives captured would more accurately determine the level of victory or defeat achieved. You could also have the concepts, as some games do, of "player victory" and "historical victory" as separate, yet related, conditions which would be incorporated for those who are heavily into competition. (As an aside, I believe the fall of Moscow, although a severe blow, would probably not have brought down the Soviet government and war would have continued. Napoleon took it in 1812 from a government that probably had less popular support even than Stalin, and look what happened to him. This last point can, obviously, be debated endlessly.)