AMBUSH ON KIMANJANO
part 1

Lt Col Oleg Borisovich Menshikov stretched in his sear, hoping the growing fatigue would leave him long enough to concentrate on the problem at hand.  It's been almost 36 hours since his unit, 1-yy Tankovyy Batalion, 46-aya Gvardeiskaya Mekhanizirovannaya Brigada, landed on this God-forsaken planet, Kimanjano, and has been advancing toward the objective almost without rest.  Now his battalion's companies were halted just short of a low ridge, beyond which stretched a shallow valley where he expected the Kafer unit to pass.  Two reinforced tank companies, each with 10 BT-94B tanks and 3 BMP-106M IFVs were arrayed in a linear formation facing the ridge, while a reinforced motor rifle company's 4 BMP platoons provided perimeter security to battalion's HQ, fire support and supply assets.  Menshikov enlarged his Integrated Combat Display's field of view to monitor the progress of a Kafer unit being monitored by one of his recon platoon's drones.  Imagery indicated two companies of Behemoth heavy tanks in addition to at least three-four companies of Kafer infantry on Bugbuses and Crawlers.

It was going to be Menshikov's first contact with Humanity's alien foe.  Kafer resistance was practically non-existent during interface operations, though the landing itself was far from smooth.  Veteran French interface craft pilots of the 2eme Flotille des Vedettes Cosmiques de Debarquement d'Assaut shoved their craft into steep, spiraling dives to minimize exposure to enemy fire.  Although most effective in limiting casualties, this technique did not do much for their passengers' well-being and the landing craft decks were awash with vomit.

Menshikov expected at least a couple of hours of respite to recover from this harrowing ride and inspect his equipment and troops but, as usual, the battle plan changed even before the first landing craft hit the surface.  Apparently the American 2nd Marine Interface Brigade which made the first, heavily opposed landing on the continent, was facing considerably greater Kafer forces than intelligence analysts predicted.  To make matters worse, his brigade never worked with the 2eme Flotille before (indeed, this was 46th Gds first actual interface operation), and the loading of the second wave onto interface craft was taking longer than intended.  So instead of waiting for all of his brigade's subunits to land his kombrig [Brigade Commander], Col Ivan Alekseyevich Savin decided to send Menshikov's 1st Tank Battalion ahead as the Brigade's Forward Detachment.  For the mission, his battalion swapped on of its tank companies for a motor rifle company from the 3rd MR Battalion, turning his command into a balanced task force of two tank and two motor rifle companies, in addition to usual supporting units.

Menshikov, though quite skilled in conducting Forward Detachment operations, would have felt more comfortable taking his battalion into this foreign, hostile landscape crawling with dangerous, heavily armed aliens as part of a brigade operation, rather than by itself (especially without the customary "battalion slice" of brigade's attack aviation and fire support assets), but "prikaz yest' prikaz" [orders are orders] and his command was soon rolling through the desolate Kimanjano landscape at over 100kph.

His objective was a vast industrial park near Fromme, where elements of the American 2nd Marine Interface Brigade were hoping to add yet another victory against overwhelming odds to an already disgustingly long list of such exploits.  Menshikov was never very fond of elite formations (as he liked to say, "If they are so damned elite, why do we always have to go out and save their sorry butts?") though in this case at least he grudgingly acknowledged that had it not been for the Americans drawing off Kafer forces toward themselves and away from his own landing zone, nausea and vomiting induced by the bumpy ride down would have been the least of his concerns.

But there was also another factor which compelled Menshikov to relentlessly drive his battalion forward.  The 46th Gds Mech Bde was not the only unit in the second wave tasked with relieving Americans. By chance or design, the operation had character of a race between two fairly similar forces against light but growing Kafer opposition, with German Panzer-Aufklaerungs units of the PanzerGrenadier Brigade 7 only some 100 kilometers from their objective, whereas his own battalion was at least 50 km further.  This would not do for Menshikov who, being an officer in a Guards unit whose own disgustingly long list of battle honors (the brigade's full name was "46th Guards, Thrice Order of the Red Banner, Twice Order of Zhukov, Order of Suvorov, Order of Kutuzov, Dnestr, Berlin, Alma-Ata Mechanized Brigade") was in large part earned by crushing units with words "Panzer" and "PanzerGrenadier" in their names, was determined not to let the Germans rob his unit of this honor.

The advance continued with only brief stops for rest and refueling until the second day, when recon drones ranging ahead of the battalion spotted a large Kafer force moving roughly in his direction.  Kafer C3I capabilities were badly degraded by Coalition attacks and their intelligence-gathering assets were limited largely to seismic sensors which could only reveal the approximate location and size of his force but were of absolutely no tactical use.  The disparity between two sides' degree of battlefield awareness was so great that this battle's result was decided even before the first shots were fired.

In his command tank, Lt. Col. Menshikov watched intently as the blue icons representing Kafer units crawled slowly across his screen on a parallel course to the line of red icons representing his own vehicles.  His two tank companies lay in wait for his command behind the ridge, invisible to the Kafers who were now squarely in the center of the killing zone formed by his companies...

"Volga!, Volga!, Volga!"

His two tank companies stirred to life as if awakened by their kombat's voice.  Like they always trained, the camouflage-painted tanks ripple-fired a pair of Kinzhal-B missiles each, then advanced toward the crest of the ridge just far enough to unmask their gun and missile pods and opened fire.  In the valley in front of them all hell broke loose...

CONTENTS:

• AMBUSH ON KIMANJANO, PART 1
• HISTORY
• ORDER OF BATTLE
• VEHICLES
• NOTES
• AMBUSH ON KIMANJANO, PART 2

The Russian Armed Forces enjoy a long and distinguished history spanning over a millennium.  They were always a formidable opponent with a reputation for bravery and tenacity.  Those two qualities time and and again ensured Russia's eventual triumph over such feared enemies as the Mongols, Napoleon's Grande Armee and Hitler's Wehrmacht, forces which quickly lost their reputation for invincibility after they met the Russian soldier on the field of battle.

The Twilight War, probably the most tragic single event in Human history, saw Russian forces in action on five continents and all of the Earth's oceans.  There's no better proof of Russian soldier's skill, courage and dedication than the simple fact that the combined militaries of the United States, Western Europe and China proved unable to inflict a defeat on their vastly outnumbered opponent in spite of 5 years of strenuous efforts, and eventually themselves collapsed under the strain of war.

This war fortunately heralded the end of the era of global, total wars.  Since its end Russian forces only participated in local conflicts which did not require total mobilizations.  The most recent of those conflicts, the Central Asian War, saw Russian troops in action on land, sea, in the air and space, armed largely with obsolescent weapons, at the end of a long logistical tether in inhospitable terrain and facing numerically greatly superior foe. While this war ended in victory, it was a victory achieved to a significant degree thanks to allies' intervention (though Russia bore the brunt of ground fighting) and at the price of long casualty lists.

The current shape of Russia's army was largely shaped by its traumatic experiences in the long and bloody Central Asian War.  Suffering from years of benign (and not so benign) neglect and having fallen behind tactically and technologically as a result of the isolationist policies pursued by the government of the time, it entered the war largely unprepared and paid a stiff price for its lack of preparedness.  Though officially the Central Asian War was proclaimed a victory, its high cost and the apparent inadequacy of the military eventually brought down the government and resulted in a wholesale retirement of senior officers in all branches of the Armed Forces.

The reform program which followed brought about swift and far-reaching changes in the military. Its avowed goal was to produce a military which fully utilized its country's impressive scientific achievements and relied on technological superiority coupled with agile, maneuver tactics to guarantee victory in any future conflict. The Army's size was drastically cut back, releasing hundreds of thousands of soldiers to national economy.  The cuts, however, were almost entirely confined to infantry forces which proved of limited utility in mobile operations.  Even as infantry forces were cut back, Russia's mechanized forces underwent a slight expansion.

Today, Russia's Ground Forces consist of 28 Guards Mechanized Brigades [GG2 Full Mechanized Brigade Equivalents], 9 Rifle Brigades [GG2 Partially Mechanized Brigade Equivalents] and 8 specialized light infantry formations. The brigades are subordinated to Guards Armies which control 3-4 maneuver brigades each, in addition to air and fire support assets, reconnaissance units, etc. The 28 Guards brigades form the core of the Ground Forces.  They are manned by volunteer, long-term contract soldiers with professional commissioned and non-commissioned officers.

A typical Guards brigade is the 46th Guards Mechanized Brigade stationed in the Moscow military district and currently preparing for a possible deployment to the French Arm, to assist other nations' efforts to push back the Kafer invaders.  Its commander, Colonel Ivan Alekseyevich Savin, is regarded as one of the rising stars in the Ground Forces.  Like many other brigade commanders, he is a veteran of the Central Asian War.

Brigade Headquarters

2 Tank Battalions, each with 3 Tank Companies w/10 tanks each, 1 MR Company w/12 BMPs, 1 SP Mortar Battery w/8 120mm SP mortars, 1 Air Defense Battery, 1 Multi-purpose Missile Battery, 1 Reconnaissance Platoon w/ 4 BRMs, 1 Light Drone Platoon w/ 3 light drones, various support units

2 Motor Rifle Battalions, each with 3 Motorized Rifle Companies, 1 Tank Company, 1 SP Mortar Battery, 1 Air Defense Battery, 1 Multi-Purpose Missile Battery, 1 Light UAV Platoon w/ 3 light UAVs, various support units

Army Aviation Battalion (Attached) with 1 Attack Squadron w/16 gunship VTOLs, 1 Transport Squadron w/16 transport VTOLs, 1 Target Acquisition VTOL Drone flight.

MRL Battalion (Attached) w/4 MRL Batteries,

Howitzer Artillery Battalion w/4 SP Howitzer Batteries

Air Defense Battery (8 medium-range air defense vehicles)

Reconnaissance Battalion (3 Reconnaissance Platoons, 1 Medium Drone Platoon)

Radio-Electronic Warfare Company

Engineer Company

Equipment and personnel totals:
Officers and soldiers: 5500
BT-94B tanks: 95
BMP-106M IFVs: 120
2S61 "Kashtan" 124mm Self-propelled mortars: 32
2S55 "Tucha" 153mm Self-propelled howitzers: 24
2A225 "Vikhr" 160mm MRLs: 24
2S57 "Palash" Close-Range Air Defense Vehicles: 16
9L11 Medium-Range Air Defense Vehicles: 8

Battalions usually cross-attach companies to form combined-arms battalional battlegroups capable of independent action.  A Guards brigade in a movement to contact posture would advance with two balanced battlegroups, one tank-heavy battlegroup and one mech-heavy battlegroup.  A brigade fighting a delaying action or acting as a screen would reconfigure its battalions into 4 balanced battlegroups.  Cross-attaching units between brigades is rarer, though not unheard of if the situation demands it.  Brigades are often reinforced with Army-level units, including artillery battalions, transport and attack aviation battalions, long-range air defense batteries.

The 9 Rifle Brigades differ from the rest of the military in that some 75% of their soldiers are 2-year compulsory service troops.  Although the initial intent was to eliminate the universal military service obligation altogether, cost considerations and the need to maintain a trained reserve dictated that it be retained, albeit in sharply reduced form.  While the Guards brigades train mainly for mobile warfare, rifle brigades are structured and trained to conduct positional defense, set-piece attacks against fortified positions and urban warfare, tasks for which their infantry-heavy TO&E makes them ideally suited.  In wartime, these units would defend major cities in threatened sectors assisted by territorial defense units (GG2 Infantry I and II) formed from called up reservists, thus serving as an anvil to Guards brigades' hammer.  Steady turnover of draftees through the rifle brigades gives Russia nearly half a million of trained reservists (subject to regular call-ups) who, in wartime, would either serve as replacements to existing units or would flesh out newly forming ones.

The typical rifle brigade has the following organization:

HQ
1 Tank Battalion (as Tk Bn in a Gds Mech Bde)
1 MR Battalion (as MR Bn in a Gds Mech Bde)
2 Rifle Battalions (identical to MR battalions, but equipped with wheeled APCs and lacking certain subunits, including the Tank Company)
1 Artillery Battalion (as for Guards brigades, but mounted on wheeled vehicles)

Rounding off the ORBAT are the 8 light infantry brigades, including the 4 Guards Assault Landing Brigades (Gvardeyskaya Desantno-Shturmovaya Brigada, or GDshB) of the DshV (Assault Landing Forces) and 4 Guards Mountain Rifle Brigades (Gvardeyskaya Gornostrelkovaya Brigada).  The Assault Landing Brigades are Russia's premier forced entry specialists whose main mission is seizing an airstrip or seaport for heavier follow-on forces.  Jump-trained, they are equally at home as airmobile or sealanding troops. Two of the GDShBs have recently completed training with their French counterparts in interface operations.  In addition to mountain operations, the Guards Mountain Rifle Brigades are also Russia's Arctic warfare specialist units.

These eight brigades represent some of the finest light infantry not only in Russia but the entire Human space.  With few vehicles, they train almost exclusively for dismounted operations and are the most easily deployable units in Russian Ground Forces.  This lack of heavy equipment means that they are not expected to sustain continuous operations against heavyweight enemy units; rather, the doctrine calls for their deployment in terrain which reduces effectiveness of armor, namely mountains, heavy forest, and cities.  Assault Landing and Mountain Rifle forces each have a separate BT-94 battalion at their disposal to provide armor support when needed.  Cognizant of the need for tactical mobility, they also have sufficient transport assets in the form of 4x4 and 6x6 lightly armored wheeled and/or tracked all-terrain troop and weapons carriers to fully motorize 5 brigades.

Light brigades are frequently assigned medium air transport battalions to take advantage of their compact size.  One of the newest tactical concepts introduced by the Ground Forces is the Air Maneuver Group composed of an Assault Landing Brigade, 1-2 Medium Air Transport Battalions and 1 Army Attack Aviation Battalion.  Its effectiveness was demonstrated in 2996 in the Central Asian Republic where such an AMG successfully interdicted movement of one of the local warlords' 20,000-man "private army" against the capital long enough for Japanese rapid reaction units to arrive and disperse the rebels.

The "missing" ninth infantry brigade in fact represents 4 Special Purpose (Spetsnaz) Brigades of 1000 troops each.  Few details have come to light so far, except that one of them is equipped for space operations, including boarding actions and orbital facility sabotage.  The other three carry out missions common to all special operations troops worldwide: gathering intelligence behind enemy lines, conducting raids against high-value objectives, organizing resistance movements, deploying nuclear demolition munitions.  Though usually listed as part of Ground Forces' ORBAT, they are in fact subordinated directly to the Supreme Commander.

The main vehicles of the Russian Ground Forces are:

BT-94B Main Battle Tank: a tracked, 15 ton vehicle armed with a 57mm electromag (Gauss) cannon, two 4-tube Kinzhal hypervelocity missile launchers with 40 reloads, a coaxial machine gun and a small-caliber electromag gatling anti-missile defense system.  Each vehicle has an automated target recognition/engagement system with two laser communicators (to control the beam-riding Kinzhals), allowing a very high rate of engagement to be sustained.  The 57mm cannon is more than sufficient for dealing with lighter AFVs and can penetrate side armor of virtually any tank in existence, leaving the Kinzhals to deal with heavier prey. The BT-94B incorporates a number of signature-reduction technologies, which considerably enhances its survivability.

Full GURPS and 2300AD vehicle write-ups will follow shortly. For now here are some weapon stats per GURPS Vehicles, 2nd ed to illustrate the potential of using this manual.

2E91 56mm, Electromag, Very Short Barrel, Normal Power, Fast Autoloader Cannon
Damage: 6d6 x 34 (armor divisor 3) when firing APFSDSDU rounds (2300AD DP: 75)
½ D Range (2300AD Aimed Fire Range): 3100 yds Max Range: 12,000 yds
Acc: 17, Snap Shot: 25, Weight: 490 lbs, ROF: 1 (2300AD: 7)
Weight per Shot (APFSDSDU): 5 lbs; Volume per Shot: .03 cu ft
Power: 7,000 kW/shot

This weapon also fires other types of rounds, including HE, Beehive, etc.

6P63 Kinzhal-A Hypervelocity Anti-Armor Missile
Warhead: 151mm Huge APDU
Damage: 6d6 x 125 (3) 2300AD DP: 280

Guidance: Laser Command Guided (Beam-rider)
Speed: 3600 yards per second
Endurance: 3.0 seconds
Range: 10,800 yds
Weight per Shot: 140 lbs
Volume per Shot:2.8 cu. ft.

Other versions of the Kinzhal also exist, including one with an HE warhead and an indirect fire anti-armor variant with selectable (pop-up, in GURPS terminology) attack profile, which uses a combination of Inertial and Active Ladar Homing guidance (Kinzhal-B).

BMP-106M Infantry Fighting Vehicle: belonging to the same family of vehicles as the BT-94, it trades the Kinzhal launchers and reloads for 7 seats for the infantry squad it carries.  It retains the 57mm cannon (as well as the PDS and coax MG) and has the same level of armor as the BT-94, making it one of the most heavily armed and armored AFVs in existence.  The latter feature was demanded by the Russian military after the lightly armored APCs used in the Central Asian War proved too vulnerable to Manchurian Storm Guns.

The above is an attempt of sorts to update 2300AD's rather dated portrayal of future warfare.  To the writers' credit, they did predict some developments (many 2300AD infantry weapons look like US Army's projected OICW, for example), they missed many others, including the emergence of Information Warfare, digitization, etc.  As a result, the game is in danger of losing its claim of belonging to the genre of "hard science" RPGs.  So, figured working up Russia's military for Grand Game II was as good excuse as any to move 2300AD's model of land and air warfare beyond "Twilight:2000 with gauss rifles and hovertanks".

Speaking of hovertanks, their absence from this article is no oversight.  Hovertanks, in my view, do not really belong in a hard-science, near-future RPG.  It is no accident that not only you will not find a hovertank in any army of the world today but no army is considering fielding them even in their most long-term predictions.  This has nothing to do with hovercrafts' technological maturity.  Airplanes were busy doing things they do today (shooting each other out of the air and dropping things on folks below) within a decade of their invention.  Hovercraft, by contrast, have been around for several decades and noone has yet been able to utilize them in land warfare.  It would appear their only utility is as "interface" craft between solid land and open sea, where neither conventional land nor water vehicles can operate freely.  Their limitations as land vehicles have already been amply demonstrated and have effectively precluded their utility as such.

Finding a way to design credible vehicles for 2300AD proved to be something of a challenge.  One of the more painfully felt gaps in the 2300AD constellation of games and modules is absence of a comprehensive technical architecture (though Andy Brick's valiant efforts certainly go a long way toward filling that gap) that would allow players to design their own hardware to supplement the meager offerings of "canon" publication.  Back when I was a naive and foolish youth (last year, to be exact...), I did some brief preliminary work on a NAM-like manual for ground vehicles on the basis of whatever information could be gleaned from official 2300AD materials.  That soon proved to be much too great a task, not least because of contradictory data contained in official pubs.

But then again, why reinvent the wheel when there are lots of perfectly serviceable wheels laying around? After exploring vehicle design rules for other game systems (including Cyberpunk 2020 and BTRC's Vehicle Design System) I settled on GURPS Vehicles, 2nd Edition.  Not only was it the most complete and versatile system in existence, with lots of supplements and player-designed available on the 'Net, it proved to be easily convertible where it counted most: armor and damage values.

The "rosetta stone" for GURPS and 2300AD proved to be the venerable M16 assault rifle.  GURPS gives it 5d (6-sided dice) of damage, whereas 2300AD rates its DP as .6.  Therefore, to convert 2300AD armor rating to GURPS DR, multiply it by 28, and to convert 2300AD DP to GURPS Damage, multiply it by 8 then divide it by the appropriate Armor Divisor (for example, 3 for APFSDSDU rounds).  The reverse process is slightly more complicated: GURPS DR divided by 28 becomes 2300AD armor rating, but to convert GURPS Damage to 2300AD DP, you must first multiply the total number of damage dice by the Armor Divisor of the projectile, then divide by 8.

For rate of fire, we can assume each "shot" for large-caliber weapons represents 4 actual rounds (this convention was actually used in some GDW wargames).  Therefore, calculate the number of shots per minute, then divide it by 8, which will give you ROF for a 30-sec 2300AD turn.

For example, the 70mm mass driver cannon of the LkPz IX is, in GURPS terms, a TL9, very short barrel, electromag, fast autoloader, normal-powered weapon which requires 1300 kW per shot, weighs 1760lbs, has a 1/2D range of 4100m (this is the single biggest discrepancy-GURPS eff. ranges are about twice as long as in 2300AD) and ROF of 1/2. If firing an APFSDSDU round, the weapon has damage of 6d x 42 (armor divisor 3) which translates to (6 x 42 x 3)/8= DP of 94.5, not too far off official DP of 90.

ROF of ½ means 30 rounds per minute, which becomes 3.75 ~ 4, slightly less than official ROF of 5.

As noted above, the biggest discrepancy between GURPS-produced data and 2300AD data is that the Aimed Fire Range comes out to only about half of the ½ Damage range.  My recommendation would be to double all AFRs since they seem a bit low (the 70mm cannon's listed range is scarcely better than that of WW2 vintage 75mm cannon which armed the Panther tank).  Most 2300AD tank guns can be modeled as electromag weapons though some, like the Manchurian 120mm or Kafer 101.3mm guns' performance would qualify them as electrothermal.
 
 

It was not an even fight.  The first volley of Kinzhal-B missiles took only about a second to cover the 3.5 km distance that separated the two forces and many Kafer vehicles were already hit by the time the two companies opened fire from the ridge.  The destruction on the receiving end was horrific.  The Mach-10 Kinzhal missiles, designed to penetrate frontal armor of Manchurian Type 27 MBTs, punched through Behemoths' much thinner side armor as if through paper, causing violent internal explosions.  Kafer crewmembers with severe liquid hydrogen burns from ruptured cryogenic cells were soon seen bailing out of their stricken tanks, only to be mowed down by antipersonnel submunition rounds from the automatic mortar battery.  Only one Behemoth, apparently commanded by a Kafer with more presence of mind than his compatriots, swivelled to face the unexpected onslaught with its thick frontal armor.  To no avail-before it had a chance to fire the tank was struck by two missiles, both of which penetrated. Soon all the Behemoths were burning and the Russian tanks and BMPs turned their attention to Kafer APCs, easily perforating their thin armor with 57mm hyperkinetic penetrators.  Kafer infantry was running chaotically around burning vehicles, trying to hide from the invisible foe.

Suddenly all was still. The valley floor was littered with wrecks and bodies, with no sign of life to be seen.  Menshikov ordered a cease fire and assessed the situation.  Ordinarily, he would have ordered his companies to assault through the kill zone to finish off the enemy, as his doctrine demanded.  However, if there was one thing the French intelligence officers' briefing on Kafer capabilities taught him it was that tactics developed against other human forces could lead to a disaster if applied against the Kafers.  Wading into this mess of burning vehicles with a potentially high number of alive and "smart" Kafers lurking around them could easily turn his victory into a defeat.  Besides, the Kafer force was no longer much of a threat.  Having lost all of their armor and great many infantry, they would soon "go dumb" and could be easily wiped out by the next human force which happened across them.

Instead, Menshikov maneuvered his battalion off the ridge and doglegged around the Kafer unit's remnants, crossing the flat valley some 3 kilometers to the north.  They soon discovered that at least some Kafers somehow survived the torrent of fire his battalion poured on them.  As the last vehicles were crossing the far ridge their sensors detected two Quickfire missiles streaking toward them.  The Quickfires, however, were neither fast enough to strike their targets before point defense systems could react nor numerous enough to saturate them, and both were promptly shot out of the air several hundred meters away from intended targets.

The road toward Fromme was clear - for now, at least.  Looking at his display, Menshikov was beginning to think they might beat the Germans after all.
 

BACK TO RUSSIA IN 2300AD