Firestorm: Stripes

Situation:
It was late morning when an armored fist of East Germans busted through a screening force of Armored Cav and later an infantry company that had tried to buy time for a proper withdrawal of the rest of the Armored Cav. Most of the Armored Cav was scattered at the time looking for Ivan when they stumbled into him as he made a mad dash right into NATO supply lines.

The Story So Far:
Around 1300 East German forces busted though a hole in the American lines and now the 309th Engineer Company was on an asset recover or destroy mission. They executed there mission right down the finest detail and we were paying for it.
We couldn’t mobilize until late into the evening after the bloody nose we took. The going was slow as the Soviets had damaged roads and bridges as they raided and retreated. Twice we had to find a different route. With the sun just beginning to poke over the hills we arrived on site.
2nd platoon got to work of the 2 cobras that had been shot down. Initial reports suggested that this was the opening valley by the East Germans. From the looks of things, they had been hit with a dozen missiles, they never stood a chance once they gave there position away. Without air support the left flank was powerless to stop the assaulting infantry. There would be now recovering the birds, they would be blown in place after the bodies had been removed.
In the opening light of the morning it became increasing clear how fast and brutal this fight had been. I almost lost my supper as I supervised 1st platoon taking care of the burned out VADS. The AA unit had left its prepared position in an attempt to ambush the infantry as the crossed the courtyard of the factory. It was a mess of bullet holes and East German blood. It looks like they gave them a run for the hills until enough BMP rockets to level a small mountain hit time. We would be able to one running again, blow one in place, and the other 2 didn’t need anything from us.

Behind the burned-out wrecks of the AA was were the HQ had made just like Culver. The whole woods where they were, was blown apart from 3 or 4 volleys of anti-tank missiles. A couple of burned out wrecks had been there prey before meeting the full armored fist that had crashed through here.
3rd Platoon was dealing with the missing IPM1 tanks. In true cavalry spirt they had charged ahead to blunt the East German advance. Burned out anti-tank trucks were what they had caused. They were ready for the next kill when trailing elements of enemy armor engaged and destroyed them. The enemy had bypassed the wrecks thankfully as 3rd platoon was able to find the crew of one tank all okay and the other in poor shape but alive. 2 of the tanks had been blown apart with the other 2 being mission kills. The stranded crew were able to salvage what they needed from one of the tanks but not until the East Germans were well past there position. With a little demolition the IPM1s that we were not recovering will be scuttled.

On another note, we were able to link up with the scattered remains of the Armored Cav. It seems that almost half of them had not been able to make it in time.

Thoughts & Results:
Armored Cav is very fun but is too much of a glass cannon for me. Since M60s are not in my MTOW and have to field M1s, the heavy tanks suck up too many points to allow for proper support. If the Cav haven’t won by turn 3 they don’t have the endurance to make it much farther. It was a fun game, hard to win when you only roll 1 and 2s for armor saves. My scout unit on the left probably got shot at 30 times before my opponent landed a couple of 6s. Really can’t complain about that.

I hope you enjoyed the short story of a battle report. I am not much of a word smith, but I enjoy telling a good story.