Tuesday, June 18, 2013

First Battle of El Guettar

Tim and I got in another of our El Guettar games about a week and a half ago.  This would be the first battle of El Guettar and the Americans were hoping it would be the only battle.  The Germans took a Panzer Company with a mix of PzII, PzIII and PzIV tanks.  Tim also brought an 88.  I was really expecting a Tiger this time...

The Americans had an Infantry Company with 105's, Shermans and M10's in support.  The US also have P-40 air support.  The scenario was Fighting Withdrawal with the US defending.  This was an extremely tough battle.

The battlefield....

US deployment...

The German deployment...

Kampfgruppe platoon advances...

...and is promptly bombed!

German tanks enter the Village of Doom....

The second airstrike knocks out the 88.

Panzers attack the hill.
Panzers move up the hill and past the Americans on the peak.  The objective is within reach!

PzII confronted with well dug in infantry.  This is going to be tough.

PzII platoon cautiously advance on the US infantry, trying to thin out the Bazookas before the attack.

M10 finish off the kampfgruppe platoon.

PzII continue the flank attack against the US Infantry platoon.
 

Sherman platoon springs their ambush but then forget to move into position.

The Panzer Company Commander is knocked out and too far away to jump to a new tank.

The Sherman platoon finally gets moving but failed to knock any of the German tanks.  Payback is going to be a bitch...
American infantry assault the PzII platoon.

And it was.. The Sherman platoon is destroyed but the M10 platoon quickly moves to fill the gap.

Panzer attempt to assault into the rough ground at the peak but have two tanks knocked out by the Bazooka teams. 

The Bazookas finish off one Panzer platoon while the M10s punish the other.  The Germans are at break point and with no HQ are forced to withdraw.
Finally, after only 5 turns the Germans could take no more and broke.  This was a brutal fight and the Americans pulled out a 4-3 victory.  In the final analysis if Tim had concentrated his full armor force on the center objective I think he could have pulled out a big win.

2 comments:

Scottswargaming said...

Great Game guys. Fighting Withdrawal is always a nail biter of a game!

Nick von Cover said...

Great batrep. As an infantry man myself it's good to see how the tank jockeys do it. And the best thing about a 4-3 win: it's a win.

I've been on the receiving end of a first turn airstrike right on top of my too closely bunched vehicles. Man it sucks!

Nick blogs at Spotting Round