RKKA is an old favorite of mine. During the Winter War they document a tank engagement that no-one else mentions and they supplied the tac map produced in the after battle report. But for what I was after I could find stats for Dec or Mar but very little for the second half of Jan.

My aim is for what the Russian army as it really was before army lists. Glantz is very clear that the most common tank for Izyum was the T-60 with the T-70 turning up for 2nd Kharkov. Speaking of which there is an old joke in the US military about Glantz “When the Russians are unsure they ask Glantz.”

I thick I should clear up the introduction days I an using. They state when a whole unit of a tank arrives. This ignores the ones and twos that arrive as early replacements to units of the old version. I would go nuts trying to pin these dates down. But I think it reasonable for the ones or twos turning up about 4 weeks prior to the full units. I am amazed with what the Germans achieved with the 41 models in the south and I want to challenge myself. Many wargames replay the tank battles and I have no issues with it. I wish to game the pivotal battles which at this point many were infantry battles. Quite a few Panzer Division are down to around an active strength of just 10 tanks with many of their tanks in the repair shops waiting for spares. So for Jan the T-60 Tanks have last hoorah against a basically tankless German forces. It is also last dance for the German 37mm as a tank killer. We have played games like this in the past and had a lot of fun with them.

I don’t think I can put all the blame on Stalin for the battles in the south in early 42.

It is obvious that Zhukov was becoming Stalin’s new favorite. Timoshenko’s fame of the Winter War was fading and he could see the writing on the wall. Timoshenko not only encouraged Stalin but would come back with even more ambitious plans. On several occasions Stalin had to question was this achievable, to which Timoshenko assured him. He then insists on being both Direction and Front commander this cutting the Southern Front commander out of the glory, what a blessing that will turn out to be.

While studying this time slice I have come across a lot of interesting facts about the T-34. There was a women who will be the driver not only helped build her tank but also paid for it with the help of her village. Unfortunately neither she of her tank survived the war. At this point the Russians were pushing the T-34’s out of the factories and skipping some vital steps. Such as after welding them together they did not reheat the joints to cherry red. This means the weld and metal either side of it are no stronger than mild steel. So the weld line across the front of the tank could easily be penetrated by a 2 cm round.  The early short 76mm ammunition also had another issue in that many rounds had black powder for the charge. The rounds did not have the penetration of later rounds not using black powder. Finally when fired these black powder rounds hid the T-34 in smoke. So if they missed they often list the target by the time the smoke cleared. So just in this tiny slice of time the Valentine was the better tank in the field. If Yarrick tries to justify wall to wall 34s he will be facing some unwanted rules.

Against a T-34 if I roll a 6 I then roll a second die. On a roll of 3 to 5 his armour value drops by 1 and on a 6 it drops by 2. Thus making it feasible for a 2 cm to penetrate his armour. After the first shot from a T-34 a tactical smoke maker is placed in front of the gun barrel. To compensate Yarrick I have him 10 Valentine and 10 T-60 tanks for his birthday earlier this year. So I don’t think he loses much. Really does he really need a long 76mm T-34’s to deal with my early Pz-3s and 4s. Don’t forget I don’t have the improved AT round for my short 75’s just yet. So the 2 pounder will punch through my front armour, yet against the Valentine I need to be at short range just to get a chance. He has the T-60’s to deal with my infantry and guns.

I believe that the Germans use fast movement to balance things. I will find this out during play.

Rzhev seems to be a self perpetuating battle. The Russians reinforce it so the Germans cannot move against Moscow again. The Germans see the build up from the Russians and reinforce so they don’t get a second Moscow. So it should not come as a shock that both of them look to the south for a solution and do it almost at the same time.

Even the Finns who will recycle anything did not like the BT. However just before they got knocked out of the war they had prototypes of the BT rebuilt as fully enclosed APC’s but none of them saw action.

I have the gaming section of my primer to finish off. They comes a time when you must run with what you have rather than a perfect version. There will be supplements for 2nd Kharkov, Friderikus and Case Blau. These will be important for background and updated army lists. We are looking at a start date of towards the end of July. This will allow us to kick off with the hex system. It gives us enough time to build a Russian Winter version of this system. I have ordered all the scenic materials needed and should arrive about the same time as the hex system.

On a final note at the end of last week U-Boot arrived, the game we sponsored with kickstarter. Very glad we did. Amazing game. @timp764 and I are learning the rules first to introduce it to the rest of the group. We are yet to play a game as we don’t want it to impede our early 42 Russian Campaign. In about two weeks we should have the rules under belt and a first game or two played. It is just hard giving our new toy second priority. OK we are just kids at heart. 😀