Camp Cromwell 15/06/06

Tunisia Campaign - double battle in adjacent hexes E6 & F7

In F7: MarkO's Brats have orders to pin down SteveJ's Falschirmjager in the El Lowez Pass.

In E6: Chris's Panzers are defending the FJ's Line of Supply against Barrie's US Inf & Peter's Brit Heavy Armour. The Panzers are heavily outnumbered, but expect support to arrive from the FJ, plus Bersaliglieri from D5.

In the pass, the FJ's 88's, 105s & HMGs discouraged any serious Brat advance while most platoons were moved back to help the Panzers.

Meanwhile on the other table, the Allies advanced quickly on their left and set up a barrier against the expected Bersaliglieri. On their right they made a limited attack to clean out the Neblewerfer's observer, but weren't game to go over the ridge at the Pioneers. They advanced armour & infantry in the centre, though the advance was limited due to the old Kiwi minefields.

The Panzers came forward and took on the Allied armour. Poor shooting by the Panzers cost them dear, but the US decison to move the M10s to the left to meet the Ities let them off the hook a bit and they fought back.

The US move to their right succeded in compromising the Itie deployment, forcing them to come on in a killing ground and run a guntlet of artillery & mortar fire.
The RAF came but once but caused serious damage to the Neblewerfers and a consequent hit by the 105s caused them to fail to morale.

We called stumps at the end of turn 6. At this stage losses are about equal. The Ities are on the table and the FJs are doing their withdrawal pretty well. But the Panzers are looking fragile & it's far from over with at least 6 turns to nightfall.

To be continued next Thursday.