Game Research Design's welcome new Europa release, Balkan Front, blends a rich wealth of unparalleled geographic and unit accuracy with John Astell's dynamic rules system to simulate perfectly the mid-twentieth century complexity of warfare in southeastern Europe. This completely revised version of the old treasure, Marita-Merkur, deserves recognition as an entirely new game.

One of the best highlights are the maps. These cartographic masterpieces represent Arthur Goodwin's complete overhaul of the original map work. Goodwin has succeeded in mapping one of the world's most geographically difficult regions, and his exacting research into the Balkan's diverse coastal and inland landscape is unsurpassed.

The Balkan region has always harbored a wealth of ethnic diversity and a resulting historical legacy of clashing demands. The characteristic variety of these distinctive groupings was especially unsettled in the 1940s. John Astell, assisted by several contributors, labored to overlay the area geography with its proper ethnic tapestry. He has reproduced brilliantly the diversity of borders, population center titles, and other features as they existed in the World War II era.

One of my special assistance tasks, in conjunction with John Astell and Arthur Goodwin, concerned the depiction of Germanic settlements existing in wartime southeastern Europe. This work was undertaken because people of German descent located in the region are slated to affect game events in future Partisan, Second Front, and Grand Europa scenarios. Therefore, it became important to finalize the Balkan Front maps with areas of German loyalty at this stage of the Europa system.

A lot of research work was required, because identifiable German habitations were erased in the postwar era, either in fact or as map entities. The captured enemy microfilmed records in the U.S. National Archives were invaluable in rendering vital information on this subject. They enabled us to find where German town law prevailed; where Germanic groups composed a large segment of the actual population; or where "Volksdeutsch volunteers" actually replenished German formations. Such locations were entered onto the map and starred with their alternative German names, either as parenthetical titles or as separate reference points in their own right.

I was able to uncover much significant material in the massive files of the "Institution for Germans in Other Lands" (Deutsche Ausland Institute, or D.A.I.). The DAI was located in Stuttgart and founded in 1917. Many DAI maps and studies predate the National Socialist period, but the collection is intermixed with Nazi propaganda and Hitler-period documentation. Any researcher must be careful regarding the reliability of individual records.

One of the greatest project aids proved to be my twenty-volume German "Brockhaus" encyclopedia set that had been originally published between 1929 and 1938. My wife was horrified when I first brought this "rare find" into the house. I tried to explain unsuccessfully that its purchase price was a great bargain if the total amount was divided into the individual cost of each volume.

My problems were compounded when I discovered that there was no more room on my shelves for the encyclopedias, and that the weight of the volumes demanded the bedrock-construction of the finest in-built shelves of our old house. I waited until she was at work and used my Brandenburger commando table to roll "success". I quickly seized a bridgehead on the main wall shelves of the living room. I removed family framed pictures, Wedgwood items, and expensive vases from the middle and lower middle shelves, and replaced them with twenty mighty Brockhaus volumes. Her reaction was typical of any opponent who found that infamous commandoes had spearheaded a surprise attack. As a result, I can attest that Brandenburg operations are subject to defeat if they become too bold.

Using both encyclopedic and government archival sources, I was finally able to develop a good trace of Germanic settlement in the Balkans region. Waves of recorded German migration had occurred, either invited or uninvited, from the Eleventh Century through the Turkish wars of the Eighteenth Century. In the latter instance, legions of Swabians and other militant German pioneers served as a bulwark on the Hungarian Military Frontier. For the most part, these Germans created "feifdoms" where they retained their own language, customs, and schools.

Gottscheer Hochland, depicted at Hex 1025 of Europa Map 14A, constituted one such German settlement. The territory was established in 1360 by Franconian and Thuringian farmers and artisans, who created a colonial establishment around the town of Gottschee near the mountainous headwaters of the Kolpa River. This distinct region remained staunchly German, both in speech and culture, for six centuries until 1945.

Gottschee is known in Slovenian as Kocevje, which translates as "colony" in the Slovenian language. Gottscheer Hochland represents an archaic middle-age High German rendering of the "Divine Host's Highlands". The landscape was composed of a broken limestone plateau with cave-studded ridges and escarpments towering over forested valleys and lakes. The Friedrichstein Ice Caverns, a famous European tourist attraction before the first world war, were located six miles west of Gottschee. The Friedrichstein range is the Karst that divides hexes 1025 and 1026.

The German colonist farmers became masters of lumbering as well as fruit and wine harvesting, although other enterprises ranging from fine linen to pig farming also became important through the centuries. One of Gottscheer Hochland's favorite products were its confectioneries, and for a time German "Gottscheeber" sweets enjoyed widespread renown, especially in the cities of Vienna and Budapest.

The territory was elevated to noble status during 1623 and became the private preserve of the Count of Auersperg after 1641. During 1791 Kaiser Leopold II upgraded Gottscheer Hochland to the level of a full duchy("Herzogtum") and the Prince of Auersperg built a splendid chateau at Gottschee. Needless to state, the dukedom of Gottscheer Hochland was regarded an important outpost of "Germandom" in the racially fragmented Austria-Hungarian empire.

Following World War I, Gottscheer Hochland was incorporated into the new nation of Yugoslavia. The government remained fearful that Hitler might use Gottscheer Hochland as a pretext for intervention on behalf of the Germans located there.

The German inhabitants of Gottscheer Hochland were fated to suffer the consequences of Nazi Germany, although the territory was not physically incorporated into Greater Germany because of land treaty obligations with fascist Italy. The demise of Italy as an Axis partner tempted Germany to proclaim outright annexation of Gottscheer Hochland as a Nazi kingdom, but the idea was tabled for the war's duration. During the latter course of World War II, regional German manpower was drafted as Volksdeutsch replacements for regular units fighting against the advances of Tito and Soviet armies.

The final chapter of Gottscheer Hochland was actually found in the Fifth Army intelligence, debriefing, and civil assistance files housed in Suitland, Maryland. By the spring of 1945 the military-age male population was depleted. In April 1945 a scratch unit was assembled primarily from teenage youth of the Hitler Youth and known as the "Grafen von Auersperg" battalion. The battalion helped cover the main refugee retreat into Carinthia, and served in action from May 6 until May 12 against partisan attacks. It should be noted that several days of combat were spent after the war was officially over, because the Germans had to fight past partisan activity.

The "Grafen von Auersperg" battalion and refugee column finally reached the American lines in mid-May. Following the war's conclusion, many Gottscheer Hochland natives were eventually allowed to join relatives in the United States, who had already settled in the Brooklyn and Cleveland areas. Most members of the Gottscheer Hochland community reside today in Austria, New York, and Ohio.

In Balkan Front, Gottscheer Hochland at Map 14A:1025 exists as the only "pure German entity hex" (a starred location not in parenthesis) within Yugoslavia. For purposes of Balkan Front only, I have several recommendations as advanced options:

• Yugoslavian units should not be able to retreat through this hex.
• Any Brandenburg commando parachute jump into the hex would be automatically successful (guided in by sympathetic natives).
• At the end of the second turn after any German unit enters the hex, a 2-8 "Gottscheer Hochland" Light Infantry Regiment (OKW, uses abbreviation GH) appears at that location, and may move freely thereafter. It should be noted that such a unit was not raised in the actual Balkans campaign, for lack of requirement, but gaming conditions might demand it. Later in the war, Gottscheer Hochland provided manpower to several divisions as well as occupation forces.

Gottscheer Hochland in the Balkans Maps (slow: 146K)

Shelby L. Stanton

Shelby has authored a number of non-fiction books on military subjects, including Vietnam Order of Battle (U.S. News Books), Green Berets at War, Rise and Fall of an American Army, and Order of Battle: U.S. Army, World War II (all Presidio Press).

Shelby's most recent work, entitled Special Forces at War: An Illustrated History, Southeast Asia 1957-1975 (Howell Press), was just published last month.

Find these at your local bookstore and add them to your war library.