Troyanovo

Played another scenario last night, yet another spin off of my Kalinin research. On 17 October the 21st Tank Brigade launched a raid into the rear of XXXXI Motorized Corps. Colonel Skvortsov divided his brigade into two columns; the tank regiment commander, Major Lukin, led the 1st Tank Battalion, 29 T-34s reinforced with a tank-riding rifle company, advancing north on the Volokolamsk road to Kalinin while the rest of the brigade, a battalion of 15 BT-7s and 5s and 10 T-60s with two companies of motorized riflemen plus a mortar, antitank rifle, antitank gun, machinegun and AAMG companies advanced on a parallel road east of Lukin's group.

Lukin's column began the festivities, slipping onto the road behind a German motorized column at 0600. Eventually someone in the German column realized that the tanks following them were not friendly, and shooting began. Lukin's tankers overran the truck column, and subsequently overran several what they described as headquarters. At Troyanovo at 1000 hrs, Lukin's tankers hit the 611th Artillery Battalion, armed with 105L52 guns about 7 miles south of Kalinin. By now the Germans were awake to the danger, and the Luftwaffe, based in Kalinin, was flying sortie after sortie against the Soviet columns. Lukin's tank took a hit in the front left return roller, and the crew bailed out, covered by their commander, who fell in the fight.

The Germans shifted antitank guns, flak, and elements of a reinforced battalion of 6th Panzer Division which was in Kalinin supporting 36th Motorized Division. They managed to stop Skvortsov's column and turn it back well south of their objective. Lukin's column, now disorganized, continued to advance at high speed, losing its tank riders and with many of the tanks advancing independently. Both airfields south of Kalinin were hit by individual T-34s, each of which got a few planes before being put out of action. Nine T-34s reached Kalinin, and fought their way into the city, but only one made it out. The balance of Lukin's column, which lost their battalion commander just south of Kalinin, fell back and regrouped with Skvortsov's column southeast of the city. For the next several days, along with the very weak 5th Rifle Division, they continued to harry the rear of the Germans in Kalinin, and cut one of the two supply roads into the city.

The problem of constructing a scenario were that the tank raid covered a large area. The two roads the brigade advanced over were 7 miles apart where the raid started, and converged until at Troyanovo they were 3 miles apart. The whole raid, from its start line to Kalinin is 21 miles. Lets see, that would make a 9'x63' table... No.

So we could do one half of the raid, presumably Lukin's column. That would fix the width problem, but how interesting is an action involving one battalion of tanks and one company of tank riders? The length problem can be attacked by just ignoring the battle from 0600 to 1000 hours, as chasing down trucks with T-34s is not all that entertaining. The fight got hot at Troyanovo.

OK, so what I did was to make the table 6'x10', and shrunk the actual terrain to fit. This left both parts of the brigade on the map, with two parallel roads running the long axis (N-S) of the map, each near but not on the map edge. The terrain features a number of villages, a number of E-W roads, two areas of high ground also oriented E-W running from the east board edge to 3/4 of the way to the west, with some marshy land in the valleys between them. There is a lot of woods scattered about, more to the east than to the west. The main (eastern) road was treated as a road, all other roads as clear terrain, and off road movement for all units involved a 25% decrease in movement allowance, due to mud. The marshy ground was prohibited to vehicles, streams (roughly L shaped, running by Troyanovo N-S turning sharply 3/4 of the way to the southern table edge to the east) could be forded by all at a cost of 1/2 their movement. T-34s were exempted from the cross country penalty, and moved normally.


I began with the 611th Artillery (2 105L52s and crews, prime movers, command) set up in the Troyanovo area. They had enough warning to be facing south. They were set up hidden, the Soviets had no idea what they were running into. Lukin entered the board on the main road at the south edge, while a motorized schutzen company and a heavy company entered on the north edge for the Germans. The Germans received reinforcements along one of the three roads entering the north edge of the map at frequent intervals, including one column of a gepanzert schutzen company in tracks with a tank company (3 Pz-35(t)s and a PzKpfw IVE), a Flak company with 1 88L56 and 1 SdKfz 10/4, a Pak battery of 1 37L45 and 1 50L60, and a recon unit of 36th Motorized consisting of one motorcycle company and an armored car. Skvortsov's column entered on the eastern road on turn 2. Both sides stayed hidden until spottable, but the referee gave information on what was being heard. (Tanks, headed your way).

Every other turn the Germans rolled to see if they got air support 1= 2 Stukas, 2, 3= 1 Stuka, 4= 1 Bf-109E, 5, 6 = 1 Hs-123, 7-10 = 0. The sorties that arrived randomly attacked either the eastern or western columns. In the game, we saw one Stuka, one Bf-109 and one Hs-123. They hit nothing, but caused some morale problems, and the Messer found a quadAAMG truck the hard way.

In the game, both sides were way too cautious. In the case of Lukin's column this meant maneuvering in sight of the two 105L52s. Most of the shots were taken at Extreme range. Unfortunately, Scott, a new member of our club playing Germans had white hot dice, and rolled nothing higher than a 2 for the first part of the game. The guns have devastating penetration at any range, and four T-34s went up in flames before the guns were spotted and put out of action. An 88 was not as accurate, and likewise was spotted and killed. Lukin's force added to its own troubles by splitting into two elements and trying to maneuver half to the high ground in the middle of the board, where they encountered three AT batteries. Their riflemen had dismounted when the first air strike had caused them to pin, and it was near the end of the game before they got in position to clean up two of these guns.

Skvortsov's column was also cautious, reaching the south side of the E-W ridge in the center of the board, but reluctant to cross until their infantry came up, allowing one company of schutzen to occupy the village on the north side of the ridge. Most of the battle here revolved around this village. The Soviet motorized riflemen, machinegunners and AT riflemen seized the southern half, while the Germans got into the southern half and destroyed one rifle company that attempted to storm it. In the street running through the village a Soviet BA-10 (close assaulted by engineers) and the light truck trying to tow a 75L12 into the village burned side by side.

Eventually the gepanzert column came up and tried to attack the village. The Soviet AT company, 2 45L46s and the ZIS-30 (SP 57L73) did some good shooting destroying a German command tank, while BTs and T-60s curled around both the German flanks. These caught the schutzen in halftracks trying to rush in to reinforce the village, and the command track went up in flames. The Soviet light tanks had a crossfire on the German ones who survived the salvos from the AT guns, but every Soviet tank shot bounced. A close assault by a command/schutzen stand killed one BT, and the damaged Pz IVE killed one 45 crew. The morale checks were spectacular. The Soviet AT company routed (missed morale by 7), the light tank battalion fell back pinned, the schutzen in their tracks and the German tank survivors likewise fell back pinned. Whew.

By this time Lukin's column had cleaned out both 105s and the 88, and their desantniki cleaned out the 37s and the 50.

At this point the Germans had decided to get out of Dodge, and the Soviets were somewhat rocked back on their heels and beginning to reorganize. We called it, a good time had been had by all. We were playing CD III.V, 15 minute turns, ran from 1000 to 1245 hrs, about 6 hours playing time (players were quite slow), some who had played this game a lot were having trouble reading their charts, don't ask me to explain that.

Interesting - I al;so looked at putting this action in to a scenario but ran up against lack of info on the Germans.

Did your research turn up an accurate OB for the Germans or are you "reading between the lines" from higher level reports?

Cheers

Bob
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http://homepage.ntlworld.com/bob_mackenzie/

Its worse than that, Bob. We have the detailed report from the Soviets, several of them, so we have a pretty good idea of where the 21 TB was, when, and how organized, although the accounts give very short shrift to the adventures of Skvortsev's group.

As to the Germans, we know from the German records that 611 Arty Bn was supporting 36 Motz in Kalinin, and from the Soviets that this was who Lukin hit. We have from the Soviet account that when they hit Troyanovo they ran into serious AT fire, and constant air strikes.

But the records of XXXXI Motz Korps are barren of any account of this raid on 17 Oct, or even on 18 Oct, though there is what appears to be a garbled discussion of some attack on 18 Oct, though it is hazy and could be a late report. What we do have is clear evidence of WHAT was in Kalinin (two rgts of 36 Motz, its recon and AT bns, and its arty, and the VA of 6 PzD - we know that in previous battles they consistently used the I/14 Schtz as the basis of their VA, that it had one gepanzert company, and it seems safe to assume that they had a tank company with them, both from usual German practice and from Soviet accounts of tanks in the fight for the northeast corner of the city, though these could conceivably be from the 101 Pz Bn), and that at least 1 rgt of 36 Motz was tied up fighting a regiment of 256 RD in the northeast corner of Kalinin that day.

We also know from a later entry in the KtB how the 36 Motz had taken heavy losses in trucks and some other losses, and their numbers are within shouting distance on what the Soviets claim for the raid.

But no, there is no German account so far acquired indicating what was sent to deal with this threat. The records of the 36 Motz are on order however, so we may know more anon. Stay tuned for late breaking developments.

Sounds like an interesting situation.

Got a map?

Greetings
Karl Heinz

Karl, yeah, I'll send it to Bob who can post it for me? I don't seem to be able to post pix to this site. Techno-geezer.

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http://homepage.ntlworld.com/bob_mackenzie/

Thank you, Bob. Lukin's tank historically was knocked out just above the Z in Zakharino. In our game it was killed just above the "r" in the same name. As I said, I was not able to represent this terrain exactly, and the scale is tweaked. It would be three miles (9 feet) between the two roads at the level of Troyanovo-Burashevo, and we had this map on a 6' wide table.

The letter codes on the roads leading in - they are all labeled, even though the forces all enter on the northern and southern entry points (A,B,C, G &E). The others are to keep the players guessing - neither side had any idea where the enemy was or would enter from. While the evidence is far from clear, I don't think Skvortsev's column made it much past Burashevo.

Speaking of entering reinforcements, Lukin enters at G on turn 1, the battalion HQ, motorized schutzen and heavy companies enter at A, B or C on Turn 1. Skvortsev's column arrives on turn 3 I think at E, the gepanzert group (tank company, schutzen company in tracks) at A, B, or C on turn 3, the AT company at A, B or C on turn 2, the flak similarly on turn 5, the recon company from 36 Motz on turn 6. The Germans must select the entrance point for units that can enter any of the three entrances BEFORE the game starts.

Just for fun, a StuG entered at E on turn 10. One battery is listed in German orders to proceed on this day to Kalinin by this road. What happened to them I have no idea, they are not mentioned again. It could be that they either never had the fuel to move so never followed the order, or arrived in Skvortsev's rear to the embarrassment of everyone involved, or they heard the shooting and decided that discretion was the better part of valor (maybe after identifying enemy tank tracks on the road in front of them), or maybe they were ambushed and destroyed on the way. No idea. In the game, they entered last turn, causing the Soviet player some excitement, exchanged fire ineffectively with a quadAAMG truck, and withdrew as the game ended.