Georgia 1957

A training exercise in Turkey goes horribly wrong when members of the Parachute Regiment find themselves over the boarder in Soviet Georgia. Phil played the Russians, I the British

The para set up a defensive position around some old buildings and a quarry, and wait for orders from NATO HQ

However, the Russians have already seen them land

Covered by 3 platoon, the CO explains to the Russian that he can't accept their surrender as he doesn't have enough men to escort them all

Two Soviet infantry battalions arrive in short order, and the minor incident becomes a major engagement

The reds begin a mortar bombardment of the British positions that was to last pretty much all game

The recon section gets too close to a hidden British platoon 

Soviet reinforcements, RHQ

The dice always seemed to work better for the reds early on, here Phil rolls up the MMG unit

The machinegun company inflicted several casualties on the forward most group of para

Next turn they disengaged and fell back through another British held position

The Soviets wasted no time in following up quick as the field position they vacated was very good

Turn 6. The reinforcement dice finally fell the way of the British, and an armoured column of Royal Marines arrives to begin the extraction process

On the left, Soviet platoons group for an attack on the quarry

Marines close assault elements of the Soviet RHQ group

Turn 8. Good reinforcement dice for the Brits but better for the reds, British units would have to get very close to this monster to have a chance of knocking it out. The Soviet mortar platoons in the fore were beginning to run out of ammunition by this time

The quarry position get the order to evacuate 

3 platoon has to remain to cover the withdrawal

The Royal Marines eliminate the RHQ platoons

And the mmg company to their right suffers a critical morale failure and surrenders

Russian infantry kept up running fire-fights with several British units, making it hard for them to evacuate in good order

More Marines and other British infantry arrive to assist with the evacuation

3 platoon still fighting it out in the quarry

Turn 9. The evacuation pulls out, harassed by Soviet small arms and mortar fire all the way

The last of the Marine platoons begin to pull out as the majority of the damaged parachute battalion is now safe from being over run

Last turn, Russian armour takes a parting shot at the British Armoured car, which it has missed twice previously

Third time lucky, the AC erupts into flame

A good game using the small cold war collection that I have here. Lots of infantry action where movement and concentration of groups of figures was important. Phil designed this scenario and it went pretty well; although we would change the way the reinforcement enter the board next time, as the Russians had too much ground to cover with too few troops.