At the start of the Malayan Campaign, British forces thrust into Thailand with the intent of capturing strategic points to deny them to the Japanese. Once the Japanese landed at Kota Bharu, however, the British realized they would soon be flanked and recalled their troops. This useless movement weakened the British line at Jitra, where the Japanese finally attacked and soon overran the initial British units, forcing them to withdraw. Near dawn on the 12th, the Japanese forced a detachment of tanks and infantry down the trunk road until, on the outskirts of Asun, the lead tank was knocked out and a Gurkha position was discovered blocking the road.
Attacker: Japanese (Saeki Detachment and 3rd Tank Brigade)
Defender: Gurkha (2/1st Gurkhas)
6.5 turns
Players: 2 OBA: None Night: No
Unit Counts:
Squads: A:8.0 D:7.0
AFVs: A:3
Type 97A CHI-HA x 3
D:0
Guns: A:0
Type 89 Heavy Grenade-Launcher
D:0
Boys ATR x 2
Misc Rules:
PTO (Exc: central paved road exists). Overcast, Wet EC. D: no more than 2 Wire in road hexes.
Map Board(s):
37
Overlays:
NONE
Errata (source)
Players wanting to play this game/Request a match:
After six turns of brutal pointblank mayhem, Stadick’s sole remaining Gurkha squad survived the last turn hand-to-hand combat (one 4-4-8 vs. one 6-4-8) in CC7 to win. Sequencing is more important than maneuver in this dense jungle melee.
My Japanese opened with a tank blitz straight down the road into T5 and U6, where lucky rolls enabled them to remove two wire counters without a single bog! The third tank jammed itself into jungle at T6 to sleaze freeze some same-hex Gurkhas while bogging. Japanese infantry then followed up and dished out point blank fire to break the Nepalese in T6. Gurkhas in U5 targeted an adjacent Japanese tank (in motion), but broke their ATR. Another Gurkha squad later perished for failure to route. The clouds held their water, no rain.
That trend continued for the next five turns. The Japanese infantry-armor team pushed down the road aggressively. Sequencing was key to progress. The tanks went ahead, even risking bog, to sleaze freeze Gurkhas and stayed in motion to avoid ATR shots. Japanese infantry rushed up behind, throwing white phosphorus when possible to inflict morale checks (that worked twice), and hit the Nepalis with point blank fire. In this way, through fire attacks and WP grenades rather than close combat, the Japanese inflicted significant losses while sustaining only two red lines and two breaks (against half squads). Of note, the Japanese MMGs fumbled a couple a 16 FP shots and the mortar never fired.
We did see a few mid game close combats that inflicted more damage. One around X8 when a bypassed Gurkha tried to counter attack into the Japanese flank. That 4-5-8 took out a 3-4-7, but also died in the process. A second CC popped up in the jungle around Y6 as the Japanese tried to stamp out resistance that had survived their pointblank fire. The Japanese 9-1 and two squads dispatched a 6-4-8 whose counter thrust killed the 9-1. Another CC followed in BB4 when two Japanese squads advanced against a single 6-4-8. That Gurkha ambushed and killed both Japanese intruders, but later succumbed to point blank Japanese rifle fire.
As the end game approached, Stadick had only two leaders (one of them wounded) and a single 6-4-8 remaining. The Japanese still had about four squad equivalents and three tanks, but were strung out after chasing down resistance east and west of the road. One long-bogged tank was also still in the rear. Therefore, they had to converge on CC7, the final Gurkha strong hold, from afar in a hurry.
Sequencing was again important. Stadick had sent his two single man counters forward as blockers. The Japanese had two “spend” two CX crews overrunning a concealed SMC with LMG in CC6. I faced an agonizing choice. Should I ram a tank into the Gurkha “Alamo” (CC7) to sleaze freeze that lone 6-4-8, as I had been doing thus far, or stop adjacent to avoid the ambush/cc sequence advantage my same-hex tank would grant to the Gurkhas? My armor took the road north and did a U turn to come back and stop adjacent in DD6 where bogging although likely was irrelevant at this point. It worked, that tank later fired its main armament and hit the 6-4-8/Alamo, but the six-flat shot failed to have any effect.
My infantry closed in on the Alamo, but only one squad could do so without becoming CX. That one 4-4-8 advanced forward while his CX twin stayed out, again for fear of enhancing the possibility of a Gurkha ambush. That part worked, the Gurkha’s failed to ambush in close combat; but my 4-4-8 also whiffed his 1-2 hand-to-hand attack and so the Gurkha’s survived for the win.
2020-06-07
(A) Denis Leclair
vs
Claudio
Gurkha win
The Japanese thought they had cleared the path but a single Gurkha half-squad managed to get an ambush result in the final turn CC allowing him to retreat to a hex adjacent to the road and there was nothing the Japanese could do about it. Right down to the final CC!
2019-01-26
(D) Brian Ogstad
vs
Stefano Cuccurullo
Japanese win
No one died from IFT, only from Melee or failure to rout.
