Conjunction Junction, How’s That Function?

Tags

Bau Bang, Cold War, Radio Commander, schoolhouse rock, Squad Battles, Squad Battles: Tour of Duty, Squad Battles: Vietnam, The Operational Art of War, Vietnam, Vietnam Combat Operations

This is the fifty-ninth in a series of posts on the Vietnam War. See here for the previous post in the series and here to go back to the master post.

In February of 1967, preparations began for what was to be one of the the largest operations of the Vietnam War, code-named Operation Junction City. The offensive targeted the communist stronghold referred to as “War Zone C” with a massive invasion intended to trap and destroy what was referred to as the “mini-Pentagon,” an informal term for the Central Executive Committee of the People’s Revolutionary Party. This was the administrative headquarters directing the anti-government forces in the South.

The operation has an unprecedented scale for this scenario series. In the weeks before Junction City is to take place, preparations such as this diversion, are among the player’s tasks.

In gaming terms, I had some high hopes for this operation. It is covered by scenarios in three (or four, depending on your counting method) games; Vietnam Combat Operations, Volume V in The Operational Art of War, a scenario in each version of Squad Battles, and a campaign scenario in Radio Commander. In some ways, it provides an unprecedented opportunity to compare different games and different scales while looking at a single battle. The key is the scale of the operation. Junction City itself lasted for 82 days and that can be pushed to over 100 if you include preparatory operations such as Operation Gadsden. The U.S. forces committed included much of the 1st Infantry and 25th Infantry Divisions, the 196th Light Infantry Brigade, the 173rd Airborne Brigade, and the 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment. This is potentially 30 turns in Vietnam Combat Operations with a maneuver area this actually meshes well with the TOAW mechanics.

Horseshoe? It is hard to separate hammer from anvil in this screenshot. In what is considered by some to be bad luck, the “horseshoe” faces downward.

As I’ve explained, the scenario manual instructs you which units were historically involved in the operation in question and directs you how to place them historically. Satisfactorily doing so will earn you victory points as well as help match your play with the built-in triggers. You are, of course, free to deviate from the historical path in whatever ways you see fit.

Operation Junction City consisted of a horseshoe-shaped static perimeter intended to isolate the area containing the mini-Pentagon and to prevent enemy from escaping the operational area. With the perimeter established, a massive mechanized force entered the open end of the horseshoe from the south, sweeping north. They would either engage the enemy forces and annihilate them or force them against the waiting forces of the prepared perimeter.

In the end, my massive operation netted little more than a captured supply base.

The problem was, the communists, perhaps alerted to their vulnerability by sources inside the South Vietnam government, were able to move their logistics center to Cambodia and avoid being trapped by the operation. What engagements there were resulted in lopsided American victories, but the large scale battle where the U.S. expected to have a clear advantage did not materialize. While casualty ratios (per U.S. estimates) were on the order of 9:1, that did mean a non-trivial loss approaching 300 American servicemen in addition to equipment losses. In this, the scenario accurately recreates the operation. Besides a few inconclusive (and obscured by the game’s fog of war) battles, my only result was the location and destruction of an enemy supply center.

A very nice array of assets. both armor an artillery.

Absent a major, defining battle, one probably can’t expect the tactical-level games to integrate in any way with the operational treatment. For the Squad Battles scenarios, there is really nothing about them that gives a uniquely “Junction City” feel to them. In fact, the first of the two fits in just as well with one of my previous articles as as it contributes to this topic.

March 20th, around about midnight, saw a VC assault on a Fire Support Base 20 near the village of Bàu Bàng. Such an assault was anticipated by the American command, due to its proximity to a known communist stronghold, and so forces (3rd Squadron) from the Fifth Cavalry Regiment were deployed to defend the artillery. This fight is sometimes designated as the Second Battle of Bàu Bàng, the first having been fought in November of 1965. When I played a (First) Battle of Bàu Bàng in Steel Panthers, I suspected that a research error had caused some M48 Pattons to incorrectly make it into the order of battle. It is this, the 1967 scenario where the defenders have a mix of M113s and M48s and the Squad Battles setup accurately provides them.

Now, for all my complaints about deviation from historical lethality, my results in this scenario were very much matched to the historical results. I wound up losing only one AFV (it happened to be the one highlighted in the above screenshot) whereas the U.S. lost two vehicles to enemy fire in the portion of the actual fight modeled* by the scenario. Although the ability to rapidly react and to establish and expand a perimeter was a key element in the U.S. victory, I mostly fought from fixed positions. In any case, the scenario gives the (American) player a nice mix of armor and artillery. It’s a slaughter, but that’s the reality. The real-world casualty ratio was pushing 100:1.

Another fire base defense scenario.

Move ahead a day, and we get to the next of the Squad Battles scenarios. This one was part of the Squad Battles: Vietnam package, as opposed to Squad Battles: Tour of Duty, but like the first it is a fire base defense scenario. In this case, the defenses are manned by dug-in infantry of the 4th Infantry Division. What’s special about this scenario is that it (as seen in the above screenshot) models the direct fire capability of the artillery batteries using flechette ammunition, also called “beehive” rounds due to the buzzing noise they produce on their way to their target. Direct fire from defending artillery was often a factor when defending a fire base and this scenario allows the player to experience this capability hands-on.

Cavalry riding to the rescue.

As with the previous day’s action, armor was a factor. The player is granted four tanks to rush toward the sound of the guns. Moving them at maximum speed, they can engage the enemy for the last few turns of the scenario. In my case, they may have contributed to the salvaging of one of the victory locations, although it is hard to tell. I also lost a tank to RPG fire during the advance, which is consistent with the historical results. It was a hard-fought battle, but it is an easy win in game terms.

Another Radio Commander intro sequence, in the voice of an embedded reporter, answers my question about Coleman’s rank. Is he a grunt?

On to my third tactical scenario, this one from Radio Commander. First off, the campaign sees fit to address some of my open issues from previous steps. The cinematic intros continue, this time via commentary from a civilian reporter. We’re now clear on Coleman’s educational background and rank. What I don’t understand is whether or not an officer, provided they lead troops in the field, would have qualified as a “grunt.” Was this how the term was applied 50+ years ago? Besides that, I finally have my company up to full strength. I’m in command of three platoons instead of the usual two.

Dropped behind enemy lines, my guys need to find and trap the guerrillas.

I can’t knowledgeably comment on the historicity of this scenario. The action is too small and, frankly, too uneventful to be notable. It is certainly possible that something very similar happened at this time and place, but to verify or disprove that would take more effort than I’m willing to put in. I strongly suspect, instead, that this is yet another example of making a scenario that encapsulates key points from the larger battle, but at a scale more appropriate for the game.

Operation Junction was the largest airborne operation in the Vietnam War. By Vietnam, the U.S was seeing the need for parachute drops being, well, dropped in favor of helicopter insertions. The drop of 845 paratroopers was only a small part of the overall operation, but a noteworthy part. In my (above) operational game, I missed my chance to use the 173rd in their paradrop role. As I was reading the instructions, I actually inserted the second battalion of the 503rd via helicopter before I realized they were supposed to use an air drop. I probably lost some mission points for this, but given that I had more than enough helicopter transport to go around, my way was likely more effective otherwise.

The Radio Commander scenario, Hammer and Anvil, has an early AM drop of your subordinate company. Once in position, they are to push the enemy toward waiting mechanized elements of the 196th Brigade. This small-scale drop takes place about a month after the historical airborne operation. My gut tells me there was nothing that actually corresponds to this configuration of forces.

Herding cats. Armed, communist cats.

That aside, the scenario is an interesting in terms of its different approach. In this go-around, the objective is not to engage and defeat the enemy, the trick is to force them to move in the direction that you want them to. In doing this, there are plenty of things that can go wrong. You can miss them entirely, as you pass by them in the jungle. They can slip around your flanks or through the holes in your forces, escaping out of the operational area. They can achieve sudden, local superiority and teach you a nasty lesson. In short, it reflects the experiences of America’s large-formation operations against the insurgency.

There also seems to be, tucked away, a scripted event meant to advance a story line about war crimes. I’ll avoid commenting too much… for now. I will say that fictional battlefield atrocities seems like a cheap way to make a point, particularly if it is untethered to reality either through actual events or at least statistical occurrence.

That bit aside, I’d say all four of these scenarios provide some useful insight into various aspects of this operation, even if none of them are quite the gaming challenge that one might be hoping for.

*As is often the case, it is hard to pin down what segment of the battle, exactly, is represented by the scenario. The battle went on for something like 4-5 hours before massive air power drove off the VC. Despite the effectiveness of mechanized units against the assault, it is estimated that the bulk of the enemy losses were due to airstrikes.

Mercy Sakes Alive

Tags

c.w. mccall, Cold War, Radio Commander, Vietnam

This is the fifty-eighth in a series of posts on the Vietnam War. See here for the previous post in the series and here to go back to the master post.

What feels right and what doesn’t?

I complained recently about the way close artillery support seems unrealistically ineffective in The Operational Art of War and Squad Battles. This is not an observation based on data – it’s just a gut feeling. In fact, it would surprise me if the these wargames, which have been around for so many decades, were really all that far off.

On the other hand, Radio Commander does feel good in my gut. If you’re facing a close fight and you call in some air or artillery support, it almost immediately shifts the balance. Fire support comes quickly and is generally on target. Again, no hard data to back this up, but the in-game experience seems to be consistent with the reading of after-action reports.

Flanking and eliminating the enemy.

Contrast that with the realism of the missions that make up the campaign. The next mission in the sequence (pictured above) is escorting an ARVN resupply convoy on its way to a besieged ARVN camp. So far, so good. Recall that the standard setup for this game has you in command of two airmobile infantry platoons plus supporting forces. The same applies here. Now, I can’t say this would never have been done but escorting trucks with foot-bound infantry seems like a pretty inefficient method of protecting a convoy.

What I do have in support is a unit of armor (M113s) plus artillery and air support. Like the artillery, the M113s seem to better conform to their performance in line with what I’ve read. In Squad Battles and in Steel Panthers, these vehicles seem extremely brittle when compared with the literature. In Radio Commander, in contrast, these are very effective units.

Hopefully not to ruin it for you, but this mission introduces certain story elements relative to the political difficulties in Vietnam. The scenario begins with some anti-Vietnamese banter from the attached unit while we are also operating with an ARVN unit – an event that feeds into the conversation tree. That same ARVN unit witnesses and reacts to a napalm strike on an enemy-held village that resulted in significant civilian casualties. I’ve yet to see if it is an integral part of the story or scoring or just included for color, but it seems to be building that Vietnam experience.

So does Radio Commander feel right?  Once again, it is a question of expectations. Is this an RTS with realistic combat elements? If it is, the campaign is structured very much like the typical RTS or even the similarly-constructed Men of Valor. You’ve got some core people that you husband through some key historical landmarks, without necessarily trying to reconstruct any particular battle or operation. If this is your ruler, Radio Commander is doing a better job than most. If, on the other hand, you’re looking for a tactical wargame similar to Squad Battles, then we’re still in the realm of those introductory/tutorial missions that help you get the feel of the game and UI without explicitly trying reproduce historical combat. By this measure (and I’ll compare to the Squad Battles campaign game), it has its pros and its cons. We’ll say the jury is still out.

Return to the master post for Vietnam War articles or go on to the next article, in which Radio Commander is but one of several games to compare engines using the same battle.

Happy New Year

Tags

Cold War, Squad Battles, Squad Battles: Vietnam, The Operational Art of War, Vietnam, Vietnam Combat Operations

This is the fifty-seventh in a series of posts on the Vietnam War. See here for the previous post in the series and here to go back to the master post.

A new year deserves a new year in my gaming world as well. Time to move from 1966 into 1967 and the Year of Big Battles. Surprisingly given the phrase used to describe this phase of the war, there are no operation-scale, big-battle scenarios – either in The Operational Art of War (TOAW) or within the other games I’ve been playing. Perhaps this is because, once the U.S. got its big battles, they wound up being, more often than not, entirely one-sided. Against full-scaled U.S. operations, the insurgents either fled or got walloped.

So it looks like I’ve got an array of 1967 scenarios that are fairly similar to what we saw for 1966. Despite that, who doesn’t want to mark the passage of time. And who better to herald the New Year than the United States Marine Corps?

The Marines are chasing some guerrillas into the hills in the southern part of Quang Nam. Note that I have both artillery and air support.

The next scenario in the Vietnam Combat Operations series, this time Volume V, starts of the 1st of January 1967 and covers the first half of the year. Although January 1967 saw operations all up and down Vietnam, we’ll focus in on the Quang Nam province in the center of the I Corps zone. The focus is because this time and place, and the Operation Tuscaloosa that was active here, is also covered in Squad Battles: Vietnam.

In my version of Tuscaloosa (see screenshot above), I encountered some unknown insurgent activity a bit further south from the battle that actually took place. The river crossing marked Go Noi indicates an island that was a Viet Cong stronghold and it was near here that the Marines in Operation Tuscaloosa fought a bloody battle. Given the variability of Vietnam Combat Operations and the fog of war, I ended up on a different river. Over a period of a couple of weeks I have been bringing in reinforcements so that, by the time of the screenshot, I have 3 battalions engaged plus artillery and air support. It’s a bigger operation than the historical one. Still, its nice to feel a connection of sorts.

Ambushed while crossing the river.

The battle portrayed in Squad Battles: Vietnam is split into two scenarios. The fight took place on January 26th, 1967, when two companies of Marines were ambushed as they attempted to cross the Thu Bon River. The point that they had chosen for the crossing had a large (500m wide) sandbar which separated two branches of the river. While the Marines had plans prepared for the possibility that their crossing would be contested, they were not aware that the VC had the entire sandbar targeted from entrenched positions on the south bank of the river.

The first scenario in this pair has you commanding one company of Marines just as they are ambushed by the Viet Cong. The Marine plan, on encountering resistance, was to call in artillery support and then frontal-assault the enemy positions with H Company while the second company, F, moved into a flanking position on H’s left.

Fire for effect!

I am always pleased to have access to the fire support that would have been realistically available in engagements like these. In both TOAW and in Squad Battles, I feel that indirect fire is less effective in the game than it was in reality. Author John Culbertson, who fought in Operation Tuscaloosa and wrote a book about this engagement, estimates around 50% casualties from the 155 mm fire. It can be hard to tell with fog-of-war settings on, but Squad Battles casualties from artillery seem to stay within the single digits, percentage-wise.

There’s no way that I can take the enemy-held objectives, but I feel like I have to do something.

As my artillery support ended, there were still a handful of turns left and I had a strong position on what appeared to be the enemy’s right flank. If this weren’t a one-off scenario, I’d have been tempted to wait for air support or reinforcements. There weren’t enough turns remaining in the game to take the two additional objectives (seen in the above screenshot near the center of the enemy line and in the village behind his left wing), so assaulting the enemy position seems more like an easy way to squander victory points than a game-winning strategy. On the other hand, waiting out the scenario’s end would be boring and so, seeing as I had a tactical advantage, I crossed the second branch of the river and attacked.

It is not clear from the scenario setup whether the forces in this scenario are supposed to represent H company or the flanking F company. Perhaps it is a scaled-down version of the entire two-company fight. In the historical battle, H Company was ordered, following the artillery bombardment, to frontal-assault the enemy positions. Supported by flanking fire from F, they were able to overrun the VC trenches. There were 55 Marine causalities during the battle, a steep price to pay for a sandbar. 57 VC bodies were found and another 60-70 were estimated to have been killed but removed.

Not having read any account of the battle before I played, I did not strive to duplicate that historical result. Despite being considerably more timid than the actual commander, I was still able to achieve a minor victory per Squad Battle‘s scoring.

The counter-attack is a more typical company versus company engagement. No support here.

After the crossing had been secured, the VC battalion headquarters was determined to be located in the village of Le Bac. The second of the two scenarios has a rather typical company-on-company assault scenario. It is better than some of the jungle scenarios in that the relatively open terrain allows for reasonable maneuver.

For this second scenario, the artillery support is absent, although it was still available and still used in the actual assault. In the historical attack on the village, the artillery was decisive. The Marine advance through the village consisted more of mopping up the dazed survivors of the artillery barrage as opposed to the house-to-house fighting that Squad Battles requires for victory. Requiring the player to fight for the village makes for a much more interesting game then watching the artillery do all the work for you, so this is one difference I won’t complain about.

Happy 1967 and Happy 2020.

Postscript

Tags

Cold War, Radio Commander, Vietnam

A couple of thoughts to add, having now played the first non-tutorial scenario of Radio Commander, called Prisoner of War.

1. It turns out, I’m reading everyone’s mail. The next cut scene was a letter from the girlfriend of my other platoon leader.
2. The racism theme continues even though the mail snooping has moved on. The commander of a Special Forces unit lets go with an expletive-filled diatribe about how Coleman caused the death of some of the POWs by being too slow.
3. The incident in #2 is evidence of the results and scoring being scripted. The reason that the rescue took so long was because I decide to approach the POW camp from “the rear” relative to the scenario start. So, first, the delay occurred before first contact, which shouldn’t have impacted the mission. Second, the delay was due to my own circuitous routing of the Special Forces. So if their commander was pissed at anyone, it should have been me. Third, I thought Bravo Platoon made it into the fight pretty quickly after the shooting started. My conclusion is that this was all an event triggered based on what the clock read at the end of the mission rather than the way the scenario itself was played.
4. On the other hand, I had previously wondered if flanking was a factor in combat. I explicitly saw it used during the fight.
5. Surprisingly, given the tongue-lashing I heard, I scored pretty well on this scenario. In fact, this was by far my best performance of the campaign.
6. I’ll point out, I’m playing on a pretty easy setting, so I probably should be doing pretty well most every time. The game has four levels of difficulty. The lowest, called “Story Mode”, one presumes would be nearly impossible to lose. I’m on the next one up from there.

Radio Commander campaign screen. I’ve completed four missions and am ready for #5.

Go back to the previous post for Radio Commander or the master post for my Vietnam War entries. You can also move ahead to the next article on the Vietnam War, talking about scenarios dealing with Operation Tuscaloosa.

The Radio is in the Hands of Such a Lot of Fools

Tags

Cold War, Elvis Costello, Radio Commander, Vietnam

This is the fifty-sixth in a series of posts on the Vietnam War. Go back to the previous post in the series and here to return to the master post.

A while back, I was wondering about what make the ideal interface for small-unit action in Vietnam. One of my thoughts is that the player, as a commander, should have a first-person interface and have his communications restricted to what he can send and receive over radio.

Well, somebody’s gone and done it.

In Radio Commander you take the role of a company commander controlling your subordinates in the field. Unlike my imagined version you, the player, are not actually on the battlefield with your men. You have a first person view, yes, but it is of the inside of your command tent back at headquarters. In front of you is a table with a map of the battlefield. It is (mostly) up to you to populate that map with the information that you obtain through radio contact with your units.

The enemy has me coming and going. I, on the other hand, have air support.

It’s the ultimate in fog of war. You have zero information about the location of anyone – your own forces as well as the enemy. The unit counters on the map only move if you reach down and move them, The map’s annotations are what you have decided to add. As I said, mostly. Some notes are added automatically (for example, the arrow pointing to the “L” in LZ), but mostly its your job to create the visuals that will assist you as you command.

Interfacing with your forces is done through a simple dialog tree. You can ask for information (position, contacts, status, and outlook for the current combat situation) and you can give commands (move-to, engage, retreat, plus a few situation specific options). On top of that, there are some scenario-specific conversations, in addition to providing some historical color, present to you some major decision points. For example, a radio call might come in asking for reinforcements and giving you the choice to send them or deny them. The decision, made through the conversation, triggers future events.

The scenario I’m playing today has you commanding two platoons which are trying to discover a VC tunnel complex near Củ Chi. Its the third scenario in a campaign that doubles as the tutorial. The first scenario, taking place shortly after your parent 173rd Airborne Brigade has begun combat operations, is mostly about following the directions as suggested by the tips. Each subsequent scenario add, incrementally, more challenge and more choices.

In between missions, there is a backstory told via letters between a soldier and his family back home. It is similar to what was done with the old FPS Men of Valor. In fact, it is really, really similar. Maybe I little too similar, at that. Like in Men of Valor, the cut scene narrator is a “simple grunt.” Or is he? He says he is, but “Marlon” is also “Coleman,” who commands Bravo* Platoon. That would make him a Lieutenant or, at least, senior non-com. Not the “grunt” of Men of Valor, but maybe a grunt is as a grunt does. Just like Men of Valor, this allows issues of racial integration and anti-war sentiment to be brought into the story. In some ways, it is less awkward than the last attempt – because I’m not “Marlon”, I don’t have to participate in the racial banter), but I’m not Marlon! Why am I reading his mail?

Bantering with Coleman. Does he know I read his mail?

Execution of the missions is a combination of open-ended commands and the decision-presenting dialog trees. In the screenshot above, my men have located the underground tunnel complex. I’m having a non-branching conversation about what they found. Momentarily, I’m about to be asked to make a decision – whether to gas the tunnels before entering them in force. Obviously the results of that decision is scripted into the scenario. Shortly thereafter, I take another decision. When my platoons locate a sizable enemy force, I hit them using my air support. That turns out to be a terrible mistake. I misunderstood the relationship between my own forces and the enemy and I ended up blasting my own guys. That second decision was taken completely outside of the scenario scripting.

The consequences of my decisions.

I feel fortunate that I didn’t lose any of my men to my friendly fire incident. Or to the enemy, for that matter. The victory narrative has been generated from the decisions that I took while I played. Reading them, it seems that I’m taking a big morale hit for the combination of things I did. I can’t know without replaying the scenario,  but I’m assuming there were both pluses and minus to these decisions. This suggests that one’s choices need to be managed “strategically.” That is, if I continue to make decisions that always decrease unit morale, I’m probably going to run into some serious trouble down the road.

What’s also hard to tell, without some trial and error fiddling, is how much of my result comes from non-scripted parts of the scenario. That is to say, what is the dominant mechanic in this game? Is it primarily an “interactive story” with RTS (real-time strategy) elements? Or is it an RTS with scripted elements? What is the fidelity of the combat simulation? Obviously, the modeling need not (and probably shouldn’t) be at the detail of, for example, an ARMA 3. Still, if it isn’t factoring in the stuff that should matter – terrain, flanking positions, etc. – we really might be in the “interactive story” category, whatever the intent might be.

This game has had some good reviews and good buzz going for it. That mostly seems to be on the basis of its unique interface. Deservingly so, as far as I am concerned. At this point, I’m still in the “tutorial” part of the game and I have to suspect that many of the early reviewers were in the same boat. As I get deeper into this game I expect to see more about what’s behind the curtain. It appears (from the documentation – I haven’t tried it out) that the developers released a scenario editor along with the game. This would tend to hint at some wargaming meat mixed in with the user interface potatoes**.

After I finished writing this, I played the next scenario from the campaign. I had a few more thoughts, if you wish to read them. You also may want to advance ahead to the next full blog post on Vietnam, covering the Marines in Operation Tuscaloosa or return back to the master post.

*Labeling the platoons Alpha and Bravo instead of their unit designations might be to indicate that the platoons are from different companies. It may be to obscure any reference to a specific sub-unit. Hard to say.

**My metaphors seem to be particularly painful lately. I’ll chalk it up to a sugar imbalance caused by too many Christmas cookies.

I Got a Strong Urge to Fly

Tags

Cold War, Pink Floyd, Rescue Dawn, Vietnam

This is the fifty-fifth in a series of posts on the Vietnam War. See here for the previous post in the series and here to go back to the master post.

What would happen if Werner Herzog made a mainstream, Hollywood-style heroic war movie? Apparently, it would turn out very well, be praised by critics, and nobody would watch it.

The 2007 film Rescue Dawn dramatizes the true story of navy pilot Dieter Dengler. He flew the A-1 Skyraider off of the carrier USS Ranger. The plane Dengler was piloting was downed by anti-aircraft fire during a bombing mission on February 1st, 1966. The next day, he was captured by Pathet Lao (Laotian Communist guerrillas) and taken prisoner. He was held for roughly five months before he was able to escape. After 23 days in the jungle he was spotted by a friendly pilot and was rescued. He was then “rescued” again by Navy SEALs who liberated him from hospitalization under care of the Air Force and returned him to his ship.

Like Herzog, Dengler was born in Germany and later moved to the United States. In Dengler’s case, he was a still a teenager when he came to American, and he traveled here with a dream of becoming a pilot. He set to work fulfilling that dream, which included both enlisting in the Air Force (they did not teach him to fly) and then, after college, joining the Navy (they did). Service in the Navy took him to the Vietnam War.

Herzog had already told Dengler’s story in 1997 through a documentary, Flucht aus Laos. Translated literally this would mean “Flight (or escape) from Laos.” In its release for English-speakers the film was called Little Dieter Needs to Fly. The title is, apparently, a reference to the moment during the Second World War when Dengler realized he wanted to be come a pilot – while being strafed by an allied aircraft that was attacking Dengler’s town.

Unlike Herzog’s first go around, Rescue Dawn is not a documentary. While it generally follows an accurate account of Dengler’s imprisonment, it does take some liberties for dramatic purposes. In particular, the dramatized account makes use of fellow prisoner Eugene DeBruin as an American foil for Dengler’s daring. The portrayal of DeBruin’s weak character was protested by his family and by Thai national Pisidhi Indradat, who also escaped with Dengler, DeBruin, and the others and, like Dengler, made his way back to freedom. This fellow witness to the portrayed events said the DeBruin, himself, showed bravery and generosity while in captivity and during the escape. Sometimes history needs to be bent a little bit to make a good story and, as far as these things go, Rescue Dawn seems more accurate than most. I certainly appreciate the objections on this one point, though.

Rescue Dawn cost a fairly modest $10 million to make but failed to make it back (earning roughly $7.2 million) at the box office. It has been more successful in DVD form, with estimates being in the $24 million range for DVD sales. I guess it just takes us some time to warm up to the idea of watching this one.

Back to the master post or onward to something new and different.

Condemned to Repeat It

Tags

Cicero, civil war, Cold War, communism, Lustrum, McCarthyism, media, Roman Republic, The Crucible

I’ve now re-read Conspirata, the second in Robert Harris’ historical fiction trilogy covering the career of Marcus Tullius Cicero. When I first purchased this book, nearly five years ago, I had a terrible time finding it. The reason is because the title, Conspirata, was only used in the United States and in Italy. Elsewhere, the book was sold under its original title, Lustrum. The book, at that time about six years beyond its publishing date, seemed nowhere to be found I was convinced it was out of print. It is not; it can easily be found, here, just under its American name.

The original title, Lustrum, is the Latin term for a half-a-decade, the period of the census in the Roman Republic*. The taking of the census also had religious trappings, so the Romans associated the word with sacred rituals. Within the story, its use specifically refers to Caesar’s securing of a 5-year military command in Gaul at a time when terms were limited to a single year (although they were renewable) . Someone at the publisher, apparently, decided that this was a bit too obscure for the American consumer and went with a title that more obviously references he Catiline Conspiracy. Conspirata/Lustrum begins where the previous volume left off, with Cicero as Consul. We follow through Cicero’s discovery and foiling of Catiline’s plans as well as the fallout in the years thereafter.

Having simultaneously read Conspirata and watched Good Night, and Good Luck, I got to thinking about what these two historical events have to tell us about American politics in the here and now. The last shall be first.

The excesses of Joseph McCarthy’s hearings are a defining characteristic of the modern body politic. For as long as I have been alive, all Americans, no matter their political leanings, agree that the “witch hunt” of McCarthyism is a dark mark on our democracy. Particularly in the mid-to-late 1950s, the consensus of America was decidedly anti-communist, but it was also decidedly anti-McCarthyism. It was a living example of ends not justifying the means. Generations grew up with The Crucible being taught in schools and the imagery of colonial Salem’s court and McCarthy’s hearing room being tied together.

What does this mean today? For George Clooney** in 2005, he saw shadows of the 50s in the media and politics of that present day. Jump ahead fifteen years, and I have to wonder how much that context has changed in a rather short time. Clooney, quoting Edward R. Murrow, raises the issue of the responsibility of television and, by extension, film to not just entertain, but to inform. In the case of Murrow, with his direct criticism of McCarthy, he was pushing an envelope – framing newsworthy events of the day within editorializing opinion. From Clooney’s standpoint, one might assume, this duty to inform includes separating right opinions from wrong opinions when “reporting” the news.

But now we are fifteen years into the future of Good Night‘s present. The likes of CBS are no longer leaders in terms of informing the American public. People get their news from a variety of sources and trust in major media*** is low. The old networks, for that matter, can barely hang on to their role as entertainers much less use their bully pulpit to cultivate, convince, and cajole.

Consider also whether a “witch hunt” atmosphere pervades our society today today (or, at least, is on the rise). Assuming it is even possible, try to see past the othering and objectively consider from whence restrictions on speech and restrictions on thought come. This isn’t the 1950s, so using the pressure of “the system” to control political dissent doesn’t seem to be possible anymore – if it was even then. Instead, the phrase “freedom of speech doesn’t mean freedom from consequences” is used to justify an enforcement of conformity without, ostensibly, restricting speech or using the power of the state to suppress dissent. Is driving a cake-maker out of business really any less onerous than seeing that a newsreader or screenwriter can no longer find employment in the industry? Is there much difference?

So perhaps America is condemned to repeat our periodic witch trials, in one form or another, because the impulses that lead to them are so ingrained in our nature. Furthermore, we’ve proven we can survive it; even thrive. A defining characteristic of the McCarthy period is, despite an overwhelming anti-communist consensus, we rapidly integrated into our national self-image that the freedom of speech and freedom of conscience which our nation protects is more important than the political consensus du jour. Thus far, we’ve always come out of it alright, albeit occasionally at great cost. We are not, after all, like the late Roman Republic, where bribery, murder, intimidation, and might-makes-right were considered politics-as-usual? Are we?

The Catiline Conspiracy is a lesser-known incident in the tumultuous period leading up to the end of the ancient Republic. In popular culture it is overshadowed by Plutarch-cum-Shakespeare and our focus on the life of Julius Caesar. It is Cataline, not Caesar, however who would seem a little more at home in the current election cycle.

Cataline, or Lucius Sergius Catilina, was understood to be descendant from Sergestus, a figure who had come with Aeneas to Italy following the Trojan War. His family name was synonymous with old money and old power, although it lacked the clout that it wielded as well as the wealth that so often is required to back up power. On top of his ancestry, Cataline had distinguished himself with his military service during tumultous times. Amazingly, he also avoiding becoming entangled in Sulla’s civil war. While he supported Sulla in the end, he also had marital ties to Marius. With his reputation and name, he expected to eventually rise to the consulship of Rome.

He wasn’t all solemnity and service, however, as it was well known he had his dark side and more than few skeletons in his closet. Cataline was accused of killing his brother-in-law and suspected of killing his first wife and son (so that he could remarry more favorably). He was brought to trial for defiling a Vestal Virgin, which was then a capital crime. Although he was acquitted, it more likely due his his political connections than his actual innocence. Conspirata portrays him as slightly mad and more than a bit homicidal.

Misbehavior while Governor of Africa resulted in delaying his run for Consul (Senators on trial could not stand for the consulship). The result of the delay was that he found himself running against the ambitious Cicero, rather than the unremarkable Gaius Marcius Figulus. While Cataline’s campaign had massive financial backing from dark money (again, relying on Harris as my source), Cicero was able to secure the unlikely support of the “old guard.” A key plank of Cataline’s platform was a blanket forgiveness of student (oops, wrong millennium) debt. Cataline lost and blamed Cicero for stealing an election for the office which was his destiny.

By the following election, when Cataline ran a second time, an alliance between Cataline and Julius Caesar had become evident. The two Senators advocated the combination of debt cancellation and distribution of free land to the poor as a vote-grabbing, populist platform. While Caesar was, himself, too young to stand for Consul, he managed to secure the position of Pontifex Maximus – ruffling more than a few feathers. Cataline began to be seen as Caesar’s proxy in the Consul’s seat. Appreciating the threat, (again****, we’ll rely on Harris’ narrative), Cicero conspired with the patrician establishment and wealthy general Lucius Licinius Lucullus to block Cataline from the office. As Consul, Cicero proposed to hold a triumph for Lucullus concurrent to the next election. A legionnaires traveled from distance provinces to celebrate within Rome’s walls voting would be titled toward’s Lucullus’ lieutenent Lucius Licinius Murena, another candidate for the office. Murena won, but it was a dirty election even by Roman standards.

Outright bribery aside (which was both frowned upon and condoned simultaneously), the annual election season was expected to be accompanied by lavish spending by the candidates. Frustrated by the obvious corruption, Cato (the younger) with consular candidate Servius Sulpicius Rufus (a student and friend of Cicero, thrown under the bus to foil Cataline) proposed a law which declared the hosting of banquets and games to be bribery, prosecutable***** under the law.

Up until this point, I feel like it would only take some minor adjustments to match today’s political environment to Cataline’s story. What is also missing is the dark forces behind the scenes that were funding  it all. One must assume that the populist leanings of Cataline, Caesar, and the likes of Publius Clodius Pulcher were merely the means to power, not an end unto themselves. Similarly the money and backing of Crassus and Pompey, critical to any conspiracy, was invested according to the self-interest of the investor. Do the politics of today similarly have a unifying purpose behind them all? Or is that sort of thing just the fantasies of the far-flung partisan commentators. What about what happened next in Rome? Could anything like it happen in the here and now?

After losing the election to Murena and Decimus Junius Silanus, Cataline felt that he had been robbed by his birthright not once, but twice, by Cicero. Feeling he had no other recourse, he plotted the murder of Cicero and the armed overthrow of the Roman Republic. Although originally to be an expression of the will of the people over corrupt, moneyed interests, his proposed tactics began turning ugly (again****). He planned to kill not only Cicero, but other Senators who represented Rome’s ancient nobility. His forces would burn Rome and sow destruction and chaos. He even proposed augmenting his army by instigating a slave uprising and taking the side of their revolution.

For Cataline, the defense of freedom was too important to let tradition, law, order, or much of anything stand in the way of removing the illegitimate politicians from power. For most of Rome, he had taken it too far.

So where are we, now, on this timeline?

*The primary reason for the census was to determine the number of men eligible for military service.

**I’ve long been aware of the fame of Clooney’s aunt. I did not realize that his father was a network anchorman and a (failed) candidate for the U.S. House. Dad, need I say, is a Democrat. But Clooney first attempted to follow in his father’s footsteps by majoring in journalism before he found a career as an actor.

***Identification of big media as biased or “fake news” is nearly universal if one allows that the culprit is restricted to those on the other side of the political divide from one’s self.

****The heavily politicized environment means there are two sides to each of these stories. Cataline was considered a reformer and a friend to the common man by many and one must assume that any of the evils of which he stands accused by history may well have been exaggerated or even fabricated by those who were against him.

*****In the Roman Republic, there were no public prosecutions. Instead, prosecutions were done by private individuals. After losing the consular election it was Servius Sulpicius Rufus and Cato who prosecuted the winning candidate for bribery.

Are You Now or Have You Ever…

Tags

1-line review, Cold War, communism, McCarthyism, netflix

Good Night, and Good Luck: Not everything is black and white, George.

Banging Your Heart Against Some Mad Bugger’s Wall

Tags

Cold War, communism, Germany, Pink Floyd

It can be bemusing to think about the tiniest of decisions and how they change the course of the world.

Thirty-years-plus-one-week ago today, the government of East Germany was struggling with the changes rocking the communist world. Mikhail Gorbachev had been trying to salvage communist rule through reform programs, which he intended to pacify the currents pushing against the Soviet system. As freedoms were granted, however, the wave of protests seem to build on them. The East German government determined that a new travel policy which seemingly offered fewer restrictions on movement between the two Germanies, without making any practical changes, would mollify critics.

On November 9th, a press conference was held to announce the new policy. For almost an hour, a party functionary droned on about the process that led up to the changes. It finally culminated in a description of a new policy, supposedly to making it easier to obtain travel permits. Realizing that there was finally something of substance, a reporter asked if this meant East Germans would be allowed to travel. Thrown off from his script, the spokesman said that it would be possible for every citizen to emigrate. He then attempted to clarify his statement by reading from the briefing, which detailed an application process. He was interrupted by another question, “When does that go into force?” Still struggling with the written statement, the party spokesman replied “Das tritt nach meiner Kenntnis…” (as far as I know), reading the words “immediately” and “without delay” from his papers.

Without ever intending to, the government of East Germany had apparently declared unrestricted travel to the West. East Germans, hearing the statement broadcast, rushed to the checkpoints to see if the border crossing were, in fact, to be “immediately” opened. At the Bornholmer Straße border crossing, it fell to the passport control officer supervising the night shift to decide what to do with the masses. He had watched the press release and realized its implications, calling his superiors to receive appropriate orders. From up the chain of command, he was told that nothing had changed and it was business as usual. Facing the crowds, he knew that it was far from “usual” and demanded orders. He was finally told that he was allow the noisiest of the protestors to cross into the West but that their passports should be stamped for “no return.”

As the guards began letting people through, some wished simply to cross into West Berlin for the sake of doing it, intending simply to go an come back. One married couple did just that and then were told they were barred from returning. They had actually left behind their children, at home and asleep in the East, and begged for mercy. At that point, the supervisor decided that it would be best to simply allow two-way transit, and the border was effectively opened, at 11:30 PM on Thursday, November 9th.

Over the following days, people would freely cross the border and, in a festival-like atmosphere, the citizens of the two Germanies began physically dismantling the Berlin Wall. Within a year, East and West Germanies were no more, reunified into a single country. In less that a year-and-a-half, the Soviet Union itself would collapse. All because of a botched phrase at a press conference and an on-the-spot decision to disobey orders.

Anybody Home?

Tags

Cold War, Squad Battles, Squad Battles: Vietnam, Vietnam

This is the fifty-fourth in a series of posts on the Vietnam War. See here for the previous post in the series and here to go back to the master post.

Operation Cedar Falls was intended to isolate and destroy enemy formations operating the region known as the Iron Triangle. The plan was to surround the area to prevent the enemy from escaping and then assault the dense jungle strongholds of the insurgency. The goal was the destruction of the military/political command center known to be located in the Iron Triangle as well as the capture the forward supply base for the 9th Division of the Viet Cong. The first step was to secure the village of Ben Suc and relocate its villagers to a safe haven. Clearing the area of civilians would allow the U.S. command to designate a free-fire zone and bring the American advantages in firepower and technology to full effect against their opponent.

The assault on Ben Suc was conducted against minimal resistance as was secured within the first day. Unfortunately, this was to be a precursor for the entire operation. Unit combat during the operation was minimal. While American forces did find large underground tunnel complexes and recovered substantial planning documents from them, the facilities were largely abandoned. The inability to destroy enemy formations was a disappointment considering the commitment of six brigades to the operation. While the capture of so much enemy intelligence was a victory, this was mitigated by the disruptive and demoralizing impact forced resettlement on the affected villagers. The result going forward was a more fertile ground for the Viet Cong’s recruitment and logistical efforts. Despite the capture and destruction of a significant tunnel complex (including over 1000 bunkers), American planners knew many more remained and that Cedar Falls was only a start.

Hello there! Can we come in?

The Squad Battles: Vietnam scenario for Operation Cedar Falls is called Assault Into Ben Suc. It imagines that the initial assault operation was contested and has the player in a full-scale fight, trying to take the objectives. As a scenario, this one has a number of pluses. First, because it is hypothetical, it can be designed to match the strengths of the game engine without regard for historical accuracy. Secondly, primarily for multiplayer support, there are three different communist set-ups available. The idea is that the player controlling the Viet Cong selects one of the options but doesn’t tell the American player which is being used. This provides an additional layer of variability/fog-of-war in the game. Even for the single player experience, it can add to replayability. Particularly so if you don’t remember what each of the three variants entail. You might be on your first go and just want to retry the scenario to see if you can fix mistakes in your first time through. Maybe you’ve picked up the game after you’ve forgotten what’s-what. In either case, randomly choosing from the three options provides a variety to the starting point that is otherwise lacking in Squad Battles.

On the flip side, this scenario suffers from the faults that many of the battles in this game share. There is no air support or artillery support, something that seems unthinkable in such a significant and well-planned operation. Although the helicopter assault is nice, once the troops are on the ground, movement becomes the 1-2 hexes per turn affair that allows little in the way of tactical innovation. Also, after the helicopters insert their passengers, they remain on the board for another five turns and can be used for fire support (a role that seems particularly necessary give there are no gunships or artillery available to the player). While I feel obligated to use these assets that I am given, it is a dreadfully tedious exercise; moreso given the brigade-sized force under my command. Each helicopter needs to be moved and fired (three times, given the capabilities of the guns) in an exercise that rarely accomplishes anything; long-range M60 fire is unlikely to show any results.

I complain, but this one isn’t all that bad as far as Squad Battles scenarios go. The operation is big enough to be interesting and the helicopter insertion allows one to employ variations in strategy. Furthermore, the use of the multiple setups solves one of the persistent problems of this game engine. Yet, playing it makes me wish for better. I had a few thoughts about some things that could have made this scenario work for me.

First of all, the American player could be forced to adhere to doctrine. He should have to designate landing zones and then stick to them, thus removing discretion on movement of individual helicopters. In fact, to spice up the exercise, it would be nice to see pre-landing artillery fire on screen (even if it doesn’t really do anything) and then restrict the support fire of insertion helicopters to that which they can deliver on direct ingress and egress to the LZ (with some leeway as provided by actual army doctrine). I also want to see realistic availability of artillery support, whether that be mortar sections (which a brigade-sized insertion must have landed) or firebase support. Realistic, in this case, given the goals* as represented by victory locations. If support fire was limited by the proximity to civilians, than include those limits explicitly.

Continue on to the next article in the series where I discuss my having watched the film Rescue Dawn. Return to the the master post here.

Is such a thing even possible to enforce with the Squad Battles scenario editor? To me, it sounds like a whole lot of work and a small payoff. And all this I write about a battle that never actually took place.

*I’ve spoken before about the difference between the just-shy-of-two-hours of game time in this scenario and an alternate two-hours of action time in, let’s say, a six or eight hour operation. I’m suggesting that the time-line implied by the goals imposed on the player should correspond accordingly to the support available.