"The Battle for Mont Blanc" Topic

Fab blog post on the struggle to stop the Germans captuting this iconic mountain

link

Fascinating. As when reading Hornblower, I accept on faith that the writer knows what he is taking about.

And now for the important question. How would you game this? What rules and what figures?

What an amazing story. I've spent a lot of time climbing around there and heard the outline of the story but that's the first time I've seen such a clear explanation. Given the difficulty I've had to just haul myself and a bit of climbing gear around there, I'm in awe of people hauling weapons and ammunition and having enough energy left to fight.

very interesting….there are also a couple of VG books in French about this subject
This one with plenty of detailed maps about the whole campaign
link

and this one, easily available, with a good overview and good pict/plates of the soldiers involved

I can add that it was'nt the only battle that took place in Mont Blanc or around it…also Italian élite RSI troops where involved ..in another battle on the same place Nembo/Folgore paratroops hastily, and succesfully, trained in mountain warfare and equpped with panzerfausts and a home made rocket launcher wiped out a Free French Chasseurs Alpins units… it's a kind of warfare that , once specific rules had been devised, call for colourful skirmish wargames with few but extremely motivated troops like Section Eclaireus Skieurs of Chasseurs Alpins that ahd already fought the Italians in 1940, mixed patrols of German Austrain montain troops , Folgore paras, "Italia" division grenadiers trained and equipped with german materiel and Monterosa Alpini Div units sporting their feathered hats/Helmets