Northern Fury #1 – H-Hour
AAR by bladesinger79, Apr 2020
Finally! Finished off this massive scenario, H-Hour, #1 of the long line of the Northern Fury campaign. The verdict? I KICKED THEIR ARSES! Numbers and long-ranged AA missiles favored the Russians, terrain and superior quality equipment from a squadron of F-15 Eagles from the UK favored myself as the Norwegians. For the invaders, it wasn’t even close. I handed the Russians their heads. I took detailed notes but I’ll skip a lot of that to tell the basic story. Here’s how the butt wupp’n came down:
Before the war began, I added four platoons of I/HAWK batteries and split them up to different locations; the closest one deployed at Bardufoss. This turned out to be a complete waste as none of them saw enemy planes get close enough to be fired at. For the infantry, I added Carl Gustav weapons with six shots. This is because NOBODY operates a platoon of grunts without some form of AT weaponry. Finally, I discovered that three Norwegian fuel tanks started the game with 93.7% damage. Uncertain as to why that was the case so I fixed that up. Other than that, I left everything else alone.
From the start, I unassigned ALL of the aircraft from their missions and had the four F-16s at Banak flee to Bardufoss fast as possible, the last two were dangerously close from being shot down from a wave of Flankers. I sank the closest group of Osas with Missile Group 2 before they were sunk by the Nanuchkas who also sank the KV Nordkapp. Later on, both of my subs sank everything else. I managed to find and sink one enemy sub, but failed to find the other. With the surface ships eliminated, I used one sub to attack the enemy landing craft before time ran out. Slaughter.
The ground war was intense and fascinating. With proper positioning, I managed to kill far more of the enemy than they did to me. It started with sending 1plt/C from Kirkenes to find enemy artillery across the border. They wiped them out! The SAM section did a fine job of shooting down several helos at Kirkenes during the enemy deployment. Kirkenes completely destroyed the air assault wave of troops using their mortars and good tactics, but not without casualties. Didn’t anticipate a second wave on the ground from the border and was forced to retreat only one platoon of survivors. Kirkenes held on for 6 hours before falling to the enemy.
2 plt/C destroyed a majority of the attackers at Vardo before falling back due to low ammo. 3 plt/C never had a chance at Vadso, neither did HQ D against the naval infantry landing at Batsfjord. In the end, only three platoons survived the scenario from the far eastern flank.
The Battle for Banak was the story. Using the battery of artillery and keeping the mobile units moving around to spot the enemy, they killed everything that came their way! I counted six enemy Cubs shot down by APC gunners (yes, they rolled a 1 to get the job done)!!! Despite a few enemy airstrikes, D Cav did a masterful job of denying the enemy the airfield. The first wave was easily dispatched. The second wave of mechanized infantry followed by a company of airborne were splotch because THEY DID NOT ATTACK, THEY JUST STOOD THERE! Later on, enemy airborne artillery and scout vehicles were destroyed. Banak was never threatened by ground forces again. The majority of the credit goes to the artillery which I used extensively. The Cavalry then mopped up the stragglers foolish enough to continue fighting. The Russians inflicted some damage to the runway access point and a few other structures, but those attacks were halted later on.
The air war. Now THIS is where I put some serious pain on the opposition. The Russians would launch about a dozen Flankers and/or Fulcrums into the area, where north or west of Banak, they would conduct a circle jerk instead of hunting my planes down. I would use my Falcons to target a few of their Floggers and Fencers before coming under fire by the long-range AA-C missiles in a deadly game of tag and chase. No enemy craft ever pushed closer than 25km to Bardufoss, but several flights did try to attack that base with ASMs but all were shot down because the Flankers and Fulcrums didn’t support them. For most of the scenario, I kept my planes on the ground until the Grim Reapers of the US 493rd Squadron arrived.
It was then the fight was in my favor.
I used a team effort to sniper off Flankers. I would use two flights of expendable F-5s and/or F-16s from two different directions to force the Flankers to fire off their AA-10s. Once they were depleted, a flight of F-15s moved in for the kill. This did not always work, as several incredible dogfights occurred with NATO suffering a few losses. But I shot down far more of them than the opposite. Killing the Fulcrums were far easier. By the time the scenario had 6 more hours remaining, I had shot down all 40 Flankers and all 40 Fulcrums. From there on, it was a turkey shoot.
When the dust settled, the smoke cleared, the bodies and debris stop falling and the ships slid beneath the waves, the Russians were utterly defeated. I destroyed 203 enemy aircraft, while losing 21 of my own. MOST of the kills belonged to the Grim Reapers, but the Norwegians did quite well on their own accord. In the last six hours I had the F-5s from Holland and the Norwegian F-16s bombing enemy ground units at Mehamn with little effect. A majority of damage at Banak was repaired when it was over. Mehamn, Batsfjord, Vadso, Vardo, and Kirkenes were in enemy hands, but the rest of Norway belongs to NATO. In 24 hours, the offensive in Norway was completely halted by the valiant Norwegian forces under my command!
The War Cross with Swords goes out to the commander of the Cavalry Troop in charge of defending Banak. I’m sure a few Royal Norwegian Orders of St. Olav and Merit will be handed out as well. For the Russians: they can expect some executions carried out!
What a great scenario! Final Score was 552! I don’t understand why the designer didn’t have the Flankers and Fulcrums really go aggressive in the beginning against all AC. #2, the Russian ground forces spent way too much time idling before they attacked their objectives, while the ground assault air units never went after the defenders. #3, the seemingly dozens of helos at Kirkenes and Vardo did practically nothing. But it’s all good. I wish someone would design this specific battle as the Russians but with more resources for NATO…I’d clean their clocks out.
Lots of fun on this. Eager to continue the Northern Fury campaign. Hope you folks enjoyed this AAR.