A most unrealistic aspect of most wargames is the manner in which both sides are drawn up along the base line, facing each other across the width of the table. In practice, forces follow roads advancing in two or more parallel columns. When making map moves to avoid a number of units appearing simultaneously on the battlefield wargamers should allow infantry battalions 1 3/4 miles of road-space; artillery battalions 1 mile; anti-tank battalions 1 1/2 miles; tank battalions 5 1/2 miles; motorised infantry battalions 3 3/4 miles; motorised artillery (i.e. SP) 2¼ miles and engineering battalions 1 1/2 miles.
This will be the normal size of individual units when making strategic moves in a campaign; forces reduced by losses will take up less road space. It is worth noting that it takes a quarter of an hour "real" time for a tank battalion to enter the battlefield from a single road.
In war armies have to be regularly supplied with the necessities that maintain man, vehicles and guns in best fighting trim. As an example, consider the Western Desert campaign of 1940/42 where there were few ports suitable for landing sufficiently large quantities of supplies. During Rommel's offensive that was brought to a standstill at El Alamein, his forces needed about 60,000 tons of various supplies per month, all carried by trucked vehicles. The nearest supply point was Tobruk which was 500 miles from El Alamein; from Tobruk to the next large port, Benghazi, was 300 miles and it was 900 miles from there to the main Axis base at Tripoli.
Petrol, the main essential, weighs 7.4 lbs. per gallon when carried in drums so that one of the larger vehicles could lift about 760 gallons. But that same truck would consume 22 gallons of petrol per 100 miles and not only did it have to bring supplies up for the battlefield but it then had to make an empty return journey. Thus it required 130 gallons of petrol, oil and lubricant to transport 1,000 gallons of POL (Petrol, oil and lubricants) over the 3OO miles between El Alamein and Tobruk. Thus Rommel used 12% of his POL transferring those same commodities 400 miles. On top of that, there was water, ammunition, food, replacements for losses and reinforcements to be carried up to the fighting line.
Considering that a Panther III tank battalion required 28 tons of POL per 100 miles; a Panther IV battalion required 31 tons of POL per 1,000 miles and a Panther Grenadier battalion required 5.5 tons of POL per 1,000 men. And then bear in mind that this consumption was for road movement and would probably be doubled for cross country travel. During the El Alamein period, Rommel's major problems occurred through shortage of these vital supplies and the resulting difficulty in transferring troops from one sector to the other, exacerbated by the increased consumption of POL when travelling across country.
A tank's cross-country range is about half its cruising distance. When in action, because of stopping, starting, rapid turning, and other battlefield manoeuvres, its range is but a fifth of its road-range. Allocate a specified number of units of POL to each tank, to be consumed at the rate of 1 unit per 10 miles on the road, 2 per 10 miles across country and 5 per 6 moves in action - reflect this in moves around the campaign map or battlefield.
During the Western Desert Campaign of 1939/42, the British reduced the wear and tear of road-bound vehicles by extending the railway line from Alexandria. Railways are far more efficient than road-services, as locomotives carry their own coal and water, and the working consumption for a train is but a fraction of the total load it is capable of carrying. In this day and age, it is estimated that an armoured division requires two trains per day to maintain it with adequate supplies of POL, ammunition, food and replacements with the proper capacity of a double track main line in combat conditions being perhaps 30 trains a day in each direction.
Simply to exist, without considering reinforcements or replacements, our modern infantry division requires the following quantity of materials per day:
| Activity | Tons/1,000 men | Comments |
|---|---|---|
| Resting | 2 - 5 | - |
| Mopping-up | 7-10 | - |
| Normal defence | 1-12 | - |
| Defensive under heavy attack | 12 - 22 | Could be grouped as Battle Condition |
| Attacking | 12 - 22 | Could be grouped as Battle Condition |
When planning a campaign, allocate values (represent by points) to every distinct unit, including transport battalions or supply units whose value should be about 1/20th of the value of the armoured unit that it is to supply. In this way the wargamer can "purchase" a limited amount of equipment per campaign period before making a choice between "buying" fighting units or supply units. In the event a losing side falling back on its supply base will be able to expend more of its points on active units whilst its opponents will have to expend them on supply.
Taking campaign rules towards their limits, they can have built into them conditions covering the construction and maintenance of roads and lines of communication. The implication of this lies in the fact that without this maintenance, the road and rail supply network can break down so that extra fuel is expended by cross country travel. To aid the wargamer in formulating such rules, the following table indicates the output rates of engineers in producing roads, and railways and maintaining them.
| Man Hours Per Kilometre | Facility | Construction | Demolition using explosive | Reconstruction |
|---|---|---|---|
| Graded stone road | 6,000 | 2,000 | 1,000 |
| Asphalt surfaced road | 21,000 | 2,000 | 4,000 |
| Single line railway (inc. sidings etc.) | 7,900 | 2,000 | 4,000 |
| Two line railway (inc. sidings etc.) | 11,500 | 3,000 | 6,000 |
| Bridge | 133,000 | 4,000 | 93,000 |
| Tunnel | Very variable | 5,000 | Equal to construction cost. |
When night falls on the battlefield, it is usual for armoured vehicles to pull back behind an infantry screen and form a laager, similar to the formation taken up by covered wagons to resist light attacks by Indians. Within the comparative safety of this formation, the crews carry out essential maintenance on their vehicles and snatch some rest whilst the columns of trucks bring up petrol, ammunition, water, food and on too rare occasions, the mail. These supply columns are given by radio a map reference indicating the approximate location of the laager they are to supply.
Modern tank design is based an the concept that tanks carry fuel and ammunition for a single day's fighting. This means that before combat can be resumed on the following day each tank has to be resupplied. This concept can be built into campaign rules so that vehicles unable to be supplied cannot take part in the following day's fighting.
When a tank is hit on the battlefield it is not always a complete loss and, if it can be recovered and repaired, it is capable of re-entering the fray. The field of an armoured battle soon becomes littered with stationary vehicles, some of them are not damaged when they run out of fuel. The side that secures a decisive victory is able to command the field and can not only recover his own damaged tanks but also those of the enemy. When tanks are recovered within range of enemy guns, it is done by using converted armoured vehicles to pull out these tanks and bring them back for refuelling or to the forward engineering bases for repair. When wargaming, the campaign map should show both fuel dumps and advance engineering bases because, apart from their already mentioned uses, they are prime objectives to be over-run by a swift advance of enemy armour.
A lengthy or strategic movement of tracked vehicles took place on tank transporters, heavy vehicles with an extremely high fuel consumption. In World War Two and today all major armoured forces have their complement of tank transporters but never enough to move all their armoured forces at the same time; and an average transporter situation would be one such vehicle to every four or five tanks.
To realistically fight a wargames campaign involving armoured vehicles it is necessary to have a knowledge of the rate of attrition and breakdown of armoured vehicles. During their advance in Northern France in 1940, the Germans suffered a daily breakdown rate of 1 vehicle in 20. The Russian campaign was far more arduous on both track and wheeled vehicles and often advances ground to a halt through mechanical failure so that the maximum advance achieved by the Germans in this campaign was six weeks.
In effect, this meant that under campaign conditions an armoured unit had a maximum range of about 300 miles before being forced to stop for repair and re-supply. Inevitably this provides a constant maintenance problem for an advancing force but it is far worse for a retreating army as its disabled vehicles have to be abandoned.
[Wow! To who it may concern please send me your name, so I can credit you for the above article. Your details must have got lost in a computer blackhole. Thanks. Kenn]
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