"US ARMY BERLIN BRIGADE VEHICLE COLOURS" Topic

Does anyone know a good match for the US Army's former Berlin vehicle colour ? I'm putting togethr a 6mm Berlin battle group and prefer Tamiya or Vallejo acrylics.

Thanks
Niall

What time period are we discussing?
I had a roomated in the mid eighties that was there and he showed me photos of his M60 tank, STILL painted up in the Standard dark OD green with white star.
Told me wonderful little stories about how they spent the day waxing it with turtle wax and using armor all on the roadwheels to make them look pretty….

Back in the days of the greatest Cold War tensions it was said that the outnumbered and isolated Berlin Brigade could be identified by the letters "P.O.W" stenciled on their backs. That might be a little hard to depict in 6mm.

the funny thing is that the plan of attack, operation Zentrum was to send a single DDR MRD agaisnt the full berlin garrison. Cnsidering the terrain and the fact that the soviet planed to move their encirvling fomraitons away as soon as possible to push west on the main axis I presume the Berling Garrison would have provided the first allied victory of the war. 1:1 in urban terrain against first class opponent is not, I repeat is not, a good idea.

The intersteing part would have been the soviet reaction to the initial debacle. Reinforcing it with units coming from the western URSS or simply bypass berlin?

Yep, nice shiny OD Green.
You forgot the chrome heater pipes and tow cables. Often over looked is that the tank company had 17 tanks (H series organization) and also has a number of maintenance floats. So war time strength was actually over 20 tanks. I don't remember the actual number of maintenance tanks but its some where between 3 and 7.
If the WP didn't put sufficent combat power against Berlin, there were plans for sortee's to be run out of Berlin to interdict supply flow and attempt to get WP troops bound for the front lines diverted.

Thanks everyone – I'd heard stories of the turtle waxing of the tanks and general "bulling up" as we brits would call it. Presumably then the finish should be on the shiny side ! What acrylic colour – if any – is a good match ?

I served in the 4th Battalion, 6th Infantry (later renamed the 6th Battalion, 502nd Infantry), Berlin Brigade, from 1984 to 1986. All vehicles were traditional olive drab. We used baby oil, not turtle wax, to shine the vehicles before inspection. I don't recall the white stars on the vehicles, but I have some photos of 4th of July parade around here somewhere.

The single artillery battery, C Battery 94th Field Artillery, fielded 2 extra (spare) 109 SP guns. Our single tank company also had a few extra M60s as someone above mentioned.

If you do 1980s, don't forget the gamma-goat 6x6 trucks. God, were those things pigs to work on. We had scads of them, too. Lots of jeeps and trailers. YOu'd be amazed how many trailers the Army fielded. Any battlefield ought to be littered with them.

Jim

I just reread your post and see you were asking about the shade of OD. The OD color varied quite a bit, but was on the darker end of green. The difference between two vehicles was sometimes noteworthy (as was the difference between one fender and the adjoining hood on some vehicles). Make sure any canvass tops on jeeps, trucks, etc, is a lighter and more plasticky shade of green than the vehicles. You'll have achieved acuracy then. Oh, yeah, and all the soldiers should be hung over.

Jim

Jim

Many thanks for your posts – good to get the recollections of someone who served in the Brigade – and even more importantly in one of the Infantry Battalions.

You arrived in Berlin around the time I was headed back to the UK – I served in 33 Armd Bde from 1979-1984. Never got to visit Berlin while I was in BAOR – though I was I had been able to.

Maybe you could answer a couple of other questions for me;
I have a book on the allied forces in Berlin which gives the following for the infantry in 1988;

6 x M151 TOW
M151 + Redeye
24 M113A2
8 x M151 w/machine gun for wall patrols
9 x 81mm Mortars
4 x 107mm mortars

Does that sound plausible from your experience ?

How did each battalion employ the M113 ?

Were the mortars in M106 and M125 carriers?

Any help you can give me would be appreciated.

The same book gives the Tank Company as having 22 M60A3 until 1989 when they received M1.

I thought this company must have had an extra platoon but if the extra vehicles were maintenance floats it would explain a lot.

Thanks
Niall

Wow. I was a communications tech assigned to a rifle company at one point, and the battalion HQ company at another.

Each of three rifle companies in the battalion were leg infantry. Most transport was done by 2-1/2 ton truck for the grunts. Each rifle company had a mortar track or tracks (81mm mortars in a M113-like track)

A CSC (combat support company had several platoons: Anti-tank (TOWs mounted on M151…not sure how many)
Scouts (M60 MG mounted on pedestal on M151 for wall patrol)
Snipers (to be distibuted to the rifle companies in times of crisis)
Mortars (4.2 inch mortars in tracks…looked like M113 with a large two door hatch atop to clear for firing the mortars)

I confess I am not sure how many of each vehicle were in each of the CSC platoons. I have a buddy who was a scout (retired now from US Army). I'll query him.

Your numbers seem plausible. I don't know about the redeyes. The 113s were around, but I don't really recall them being of any use. In '84-'86, the unit was a leg infantry unit. Most of the tracks were command vehicles, M577s, and mortar tracks (not sure of the nomenclature…looked a lot like a M113.

Regards the tank co, I recall with certainty it was floaters and not an extra platoon. The wisdom of the time was that treaty limited us to one company of armor and one artillery battery. Treaty apparently allowed for spares :)

Jim

Jim

Thanks for the info. It has certainly cleared up one or two things.

The 81mm mortar tracks would be M125 I would expect – the 4.2inch mortar tracks should be M106.

The figure of 24 x M113 has always puzzled me a little – too many for "just" command vehicles, too few for a standard mech inf battalion. I've often wondered if the figure actually includes the mortar vehicles wrongly included as M113 APC's.

Anything your friend can remember would be great.

With regard to the colours – I have seen a post somewhere on Olive Drab (and there are lots of variations on the OD theme) which suggests Tamiya XF-62 is a good match.

I was thinking about it today again while talking to a gaming friend who was an army brat in the 70's. He also recalled that the synthetic canvas was an odd shade. Again, for any 2-1/2 ton trucks or covered jeeps or gamma goats or unimogs, use a different color for the canvass.

Of course, the M151s with the TOWS and the M60 pedestals will never have covers. All the TOW jeeps had trailers, though, and all trailers had a canvass cover, FWIW.

I haven't gotten through to my buddy yet. Will let you know when I do.

Jim

Spoke to my friend today. He says our TO&E was "H" type, with serious modifications. The mods included many extra vehicles. He recalled that C Co, 6th Bn 502 Inf Regt (formerly 4th bn 6th Inf) was fully mechanized. That might account for your excess 113's from your other source.

We had many, many trucks. Enough plus extra to be a completely motorized battalion. Many of these were associated with the HQ company, but used as assets to move the battalion.

CSC (combat support company) had snipers as I said before. CSC also had an AT platoon with three squads of three M151 mounted TOWS. Two extra M151s made up a "hq squad" for the AT platoon.

Hope this helped.

Jim

Jim

Many thanks for your latest post – one company being completely mechanised would certainly bump the M113 totals up – and in a strange way would make sense. Enoughh APC's for a mech company leaving the others as "leg infantry". We Brits did something a little similar – each Bn had a platoon of 4 FV432's fitted with Rarden 30mm turrets. I haven't had it confirmed by anyone who served in our Berlin Brigade but I imagine the Bn CO had an option as to how to deploy the APC's – either as fire support or mech platoon vehicles.

The M151 TOW figures you give tie in perfectly with the book I have (published in Germany) – so it looks fairly accurate.

Many thanks again.

I can't remember his name, but I have spoken with an ex Sergeant-Major from the British Berlin Brigade on a couple of occasions, who did confirm that each infantry battalion had 4x FV432/30, which were held as a distinct platoon under Support Company for direct fire support during street-fighting ops.

Just to add: the three British Berlin battalions were fully mechanised with FV432 and there were apparently no CVR(T) vehicles in Berlin. The Berlin armoured squadron was also unusual in that it was over-establishment, with four troops or four tanks each – akin to a WW2 armoured squadron.