"FoF campaign - Afghanistan 1980s" Topic

Hi,
Our club started a new Force on Force campaign game "Enduring Oppression", where three players play against me the umpire trying to pacify a fictional Afghan province during the Soviet occupation. I'm trying out some era-specific rules, e.g. 1/3 chance of Soviet soldiers being sick before any scenario, different DRA factions (our Afghan player chose khalqi hard-line revolutionary), MR troops having to pass TQ test to run in bad terrain due to bad boots, etc.

Some pics and a brief description at our club site link

Cheers,
Aksu of GeMiGaBoK club

Looks great! I started gaming this war back in the 90's. It can be very interesting. My first units were DRA. I used Combat Miniatures 20mm.

Thanks,

John

That looks and reads great. I have some Mongrel Miniatures (now Newline Designs) 28mm Soviets, Afghans and DRA figures, supplemented with Eureka Afghans, that I skirmish with.

I like your battle game. Thanks.

Interesting idea, especially the pacification/annihilation of areas lowering the insurrection level. The 1/3 chance should be universal, military units are rarely up to strength due to illness, injury and other factors. What seriously hampered Soviet operations were the all too frequent Typhus outbreaks which sometimes reduced platoons to below half strength. Perhaps a random roll with soldiers needing a 4-6 to be unaffected, or roll by units and if affected most soldiers are out, some permanently. The TQ roll seems a bit OTT, but units who run in boots might have a higher chance of being out of action next scenario.

I do hope if the stalwart guardians of International Socialism are going to have specific difficulties foisted on the by capitalist wargamers, however historical, the Dushman will similarly have a unique set of historical foibles and problems?

Hi all,
Thanks for the comments. About the figs: we are using 20 mm Cubans to fill in for the DRA, I still haven't got round to ordering proper DRA figs. The Soviets and Afghans are a mix of Sandsmodels and Elhiem.
About the campaign specific rules: I still have not made up my mind on which will be in the Fog of war deck, which will be scenario/era specific. For example the boots thing could be a fog card, countered by "Adidas sneakers!" card.
Anyway, once I have something more concrete to show as to the list of things I think fit the era it will be easier to comment. And certainly the dushman should suffer too!
Cheers,
Aksu

great blog pics, excellent work.

Looks like fun – great map, Kerrang and Pish Pawr!

We gamed this years back with DRA and Soviet rescue attempts for downed aircrew and damaged vehicles etc……….of course the 'Dushmen' were Western allies then………..

Might be simpler to reduce each squad by 1D4 or something, or reduce the platoon by 1D6+3.

I forget which book it was I read that discussed that often BMP's were sent on patrol with no infantry inside (or on top) due to a lack of personnel in the area. Might explain their heavy losses.

"The bear went over the mountain" also repeatedly emphasize platoon and company commanders being too cautious in engaging the enemy but generally fighting well when in firefights. The insurgents of course relied on shoot and scoot so interesting challenges for morale systems:

Soviets hesitant to get stuck in but stays in the fight.
Insurgents eager to engage but runs fast.
As for Government Afghan troops, the Soviets pretty much universally despised them, but how much of that is their view versus reality is for anyone to decide. Certainly, they were unlikely to be of high quality.

Might want to give the Russkies the options to mine areas in the campaign. Huge amounts of mines were laid so let them drop mines on known insurgent travel routes. I'd also institute a limit on artillery fire into villages.
It definitely happened but there were political controls to limit local damage.
Maybe after each use (or each use after the first), there's a chance the commanding officer gets sent home to explain himself in Moscow and a less experienced man takes over?

Some villages, at the base of the Panjshir Valley, were completely destroyed by air strikes and artillery bombardments were so overwhelming the rivers ran black with cordite runoff, when it rained. So perhaps certain areas were protected, but if in a free fire zone everything could ,and often would, be targeted..

Hi,
Good input, thanks. At the moment I'm not using any of the collateral damage restrictions for the Soviets, mainly as L.Grau emphasises in "The bear…" and IIRC some other articles that the Soviets adopted a classic anti-guerilla strategy of deliberately attempting to empty the countryside of the local population by destroying not only the villages but also the crops and livestock, and in many of the vignettes in "The bear…" and "The other side of the mountain" it is described how villages routinely suffer a 15-30 min artgatovka, strafing by gunships and / or fixed wing assets before the soviets sweep in.

Force on Force already gives pretty good rules to emulate the shoot and scoot capabilities of the dushman – they can disappear pretty well if they are out of sight, they can move around the battlefield undetected etc. Actually, as the soviets probably have a ridiculous advantage in available firepower, the dushman would be silly to stay in a fight unless they are defending well prepared mountain positions.

The point about mines is good. Some related tactical ideas from the sources
- Dushman driving flocks of sheep/goats into minefields to detect them
- Using recoilless rifles to blast a path through a defensive belt of mines during an attack

About the local troops: The Afghan troops in this campaign are divided into three varieties:
- Plain vanilla DRA – high desertion rate, low confidence
- Sarandoy (ministry of interior, party hardline) – better morale, normal confidence
- KhAD (secret police) – low desertion rate, access to infiltrators and better intelligence about enemy intent.

In our campaign we are already seeing a bit of tension between the Soviet advisors and the local troops – as in "why should it be me who has to advance, while you foreign guys are staying in overwatch positions?" – Fiction emulating history ;)

Cheers,
Aksu

Hi, quick note about the collateral damage and the nature of these games in general. This mini-campaign is mostly going to portray the aggressive moments in the campaign, i.e. the larger sweeps and attacks, or strategically relevant supply disruption actions by either side. Therefore the peaceful co-existence of the russian outposts and afghan villages is out-of-scope for this campaign.
Rodric Braithwaite's "Afgantsy" gives many intersting accounts of the everyday life in the countryside, where (some) Soviet officers and advisors were genuinely making every effort to minimise the violence and damage to the community.
An example: One convoy commander was always respectful of the locals when driving through their villages, slowing down, stopping to settle disputes after accidents, paying for damages with petrol and goods, etc. Contrast this with his colleague, who always drove at full speed through villages. Well, guess whose convoys were targeted, and who was left alone.
Cheers,
Aksu