[WarInEur] Queries

[SGMINFO at aol.com]

In a message dated 14/12/2007 19:03:33 GMT Standard Time, kentsue at cox.net  
writes:

> 6-5  should be able to opt for converting a retreat into a  AEX


In isolation this is not an unattractive proposition. But in the case of  the 
amphibious assault we are faced with the invidious position of choosing the  
lesser of two evils, backed nto this position by the intention and conflict of 
 rules.
 
 If we accept the proposition that the 6-5 may take a step loss yet  remain 
in posession of the hex. What then the position of the assault? Since  they 
have no disembarkation hex they may not coexist in the same hex as the  defender, 
and themselves must be eliminated. A similar position to the  airborne.
 
Since we can decree the no retreat order, then such a fanatical defence can  
be established at will along the entire coastline of france, any  allied plan 
is now in serious trouble.
 
The difference to airborne, is the sheer scale of the potential  desaster.
 
Rommel (correctly?) predicted that the first 24hrs would be the decisive  
point. Either an allied force was defeated at the waters edge, at their most  
vulnerable, or the battle was likely lost, for once ashore the technical and  
materiel superiority of the allied war machine would guarrantee their triumph  
over the defenses. Rommel may not have been wrong in his analysis, but he was  
wrong in fact (close as the decision came at Omaha). There was not an occasion  
in the landings where the result, generally, was in doubt. Nor was their an  
occasion when such an allied assault in the form transpiring failed. By June  
1944 the Allies had detailed mastery of tchniques that they felt ensured their 
 success at the waters edge, the nearest we come to the problem is the 
desaster  at Dieppe, which would look to be the nature of the defeat with a no 
retreat  option, and retention of the waters edge hex. A dieppe style desaster 
would  leave the attacker with a failed beachead, and the survivors returning to 
the UK  in bg form, not totally eliminated..
 Given the track record of the landings after 1941 with the allied  
organisation, it is reasonable to take the position that the attacking landing  forces 
will take posession of the hex during the assault, on all occasions.  There is 
no experimental position to back the proposition that the naval assault  will 
not result in a successful landing.
 
Given that, then the rules interpretation is not unreasonable. The hex is  
always evacuated by the defender.
 
The defender's position perforce, is always then at which he his cast in th  
role of picking up the pieces after the landing, attempting the second bst  
alternative, sealing off the beachhead.
 
Thus the assaulting forces must attack, and must assure themselves of a  
result in combat, either an enemy retreat, or an enemy loss, both of which  compel 
the defender to vacate the hex. The defenders option to stand and die in  
denial being removed by the 'amphibious' assault being the declared method of  
attack.
 
Given those imperatives in the simul;ation, it is difficult to see another  
alternative that offers us as good or as effective a simulation of the real  
event.
 
 
-|steve|-



   
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