Another Entry for the Fistful Of Tows Project

 

Polish 20th Tank Division 1997

                                                 for the Fistful of TOWs Twilight: 2000 project

  I had so much fun writing the previous article, I decided to do another one. This time, I grabbed another one of my Micro Mark lists, this one on the 20th Tank Division, which was part of the Polish 1st Army. In Chico's Advent Crown document, which I heartily recommend for anyone doing any Fistful of Tows games set in the Twilight War, 1st Polish Army gets pretty shot up defending Northern Poland, especially around Gdansk and the northern Wisla river region. 20th Tank Division probably did not fare well in these engagements.

  I chose the 20th mainly because of it's makeup, it has a lot of mix of old and, new, and has some "school units" that would be interesting to field on the tabletop. Either way, it makes for a neat unit to run on the tabletop.

  I also didn't add in the usual Army and Front level assets, as I think I will include this in their own blog entry. 

 

  So, assumptions I made here:

• The T-72s got some minor upgrades, better ammunition from Soviet stocks, and perhaps fitted for side skirts made locally? (Use later pen numbers for Soviet T-72s and improve HEAT defense by one letter to the flank). 
• The tank battalion in the 49th Mechanized Regiment got upgrades to T-55AM standard, as the refit kits were made in Poland, and I am sure in the winter of 1996-97, those factories were working triple shifts!
• Polish BMP in selected units, of which the 20th was one, had their BMPs upgraded to BMP-1P standard.
• All Polish BRDM AT-3 Sagger in the 20th have been upgraded to AT-5 Spandrel models (purchases from the Soviets).
• All Tank Regiments in the division got SA-13 for their ADA companies.

So, without further ado.

____________________________

Polish 20th Tank Division, April 1997

Quality: Fair to Average (more Average on Polish soil, fair in the earlier fighting in Germany)

Artillery Accuracy and Friction Response: 3+ / 2+

Combat Formations

24th, 28th, and 68th Tank Regiments:

• Base
• 1 ZSU-23-4
• 1 SA-13
• 2 recon BRDM-2
• 3 Tank Battalions
• 6 T-72M1 (24th), 6 T-72M (28th), or 6 T-72A (68th)
• 1 Mechanized Company
• 1 BMP-1P + 1 Infantry Stand w/SAM Stand
• 2 BMP-1P + 2 Infantry Stands
• 1 Engineer Company
• 1 OT-64A + 1 Engineer Stand
• 1 BLG-67 (use same model as MTU-55) AVLB
• 1 Regimental 122mm SP Artillery Battalion [See the Artillery Support Groups]

49th Mechanized Regiment:

• Base
• 1 recon BRDM-2
• 1 ZU-23-2 Stand and 1 Truck
• AT Missile Battery
• BRDM-2 with AT-5 Spandrel
• 3 BMP Mechanized Battalions; each with:
• 3 BMP-1P + 3 Infantry Stands w/SAM 
• 6 BMP-1P + 6 Infantry Stands
• 1 120mm Mortar Stand + 1 Truck
• 1 Tank Battalion
• 9 T-55AM
• 1 Engineer Company
• 1 OT-64A + 1 Engineer Stand
• 1 UAZ-469 + Mine Clearing Charge equipment
• 1 Regimental 122mm SP Artillery Battalion [See the Artillery Support Groups]

___________________________________________________________________________

Attachments

8th Divisional Recon Battalion (Maximum of one)

• 2 recon BMP-R
• 2 recon BRDM
• 2 recon infantry stands + 2 UAZ-469

75th AA Regiment (Maximum of one)

• 1 ZU-23-2 Stand + 1 Truck
• 4 SA-6 SP SAM

7th Engineer Battalion (Maximum of one)

• 3 Engineer Stands + 3 OT-64A
• 1 T-55 with mine plow
• 1 PTS-M

Artillery Support Groups

Regimental 122mm SP Artillery Battalion

• 2 2S1 SP 122mm Guns [1 FO +1 UAZ]

Divisional 122mm SP Artillery Battalion (Maximum of 2)

• 3 2S1 SP 122mm Guns [1 FO + 1 UAZ]

Divisional MRL Battalion (Maximum of 1)

• 4 BM-21 122mm MRLs [Light MRL]

___________________________________________

Well, that's it for the 20th, I'll cover another selected division sometime next week!

TTFN!

FFT 3 and the Twilight War

 So, I have been working on my Fistful of Tows 3 armies of late, as I have a ton of unpainted micro armor that I kinda want to turn into painted micro armor. (and have been working to do so, I'll have some articles on how that's been going soon!) And, I have been thinking. I've always touted FFT 3 as a great set of rules to do the operational level clashes of the organized phase of the Twilight War (1995-1997, and perhaps even 1998?)

 Well, I have a lot of Micro-Mark lists from Mark Bevis lying around my Wargames Vault library, and I wanted to use them to convert to lists I can use for a plain vanilla "Third World War." Well, an idea hit me like a brick through the proverbial window. Why can't I also use them for Twilight War organizations as well? Right? 

  So, I am embarking on two new projects, one is, of course, to make some headway in reorganizing and painting my FFT 3 armies, and second? To create parallel army lists for FFT 3 so people can game out the Twilight War on the tabletop. 

  But Jason, what of some of the weirdo vehicles like the M1A2 Giraffe? What do we do for that? Well, I stated those out and have enclosed a link to those items here. So, without further ado, let's discuss my first list, a list for the humble OTK Territorial Defense Units (What most Twilight: 2000 gamers know as the ORMO!)

     To quote Wikipedia: 

      The OTK was founded in 1965 to help defend Polish territory in situations where the Polish People's Army was engaged abroad under Warsaw Pact obligations. Although their primary mission was defending the homeland, the OTK also had the Warsaw Pact mission of transporting Soviet forces and supplies across Poland in wartime. Formed mainly from units shifted from the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the OTK went under a new Inspectorate for National Territorial Defense in the Ministry of National Defense. The OTK included the Internal Defense Forces (Polish: Wojska Obrony Wewnętrznej - WOW, the largest unit) and several smaller territorial defense units.

    The OTK, thus was the second line militia forces one would see in most communist countries that answered more to the party or a parallel organization, rather than the military itself. The WOW, which was the internal defense forces, will be covered in a different article. Mr. Bevis has them organized into several territorial defense brigades, and he has a decent breakdown of the units in his list. According to him, he has 2 Brigades centered on Warsaw and Katowicka, and 7 regiments centered on the other major cities in Poland. Now, in our timeline, by 1990, the OTK was seen as fairly ineffective, as there was a bit of mission creep, (many social organizations, such as the boy scouts, fell under the perview of the OTK) and many Polish officers saw an assignment to the OTK as a fairly easy assignment before retirement, or even one they could pursue after retirement (aka, they had a lot of dead wood to clear out.) I suspect the situation didn't improve until East Germany fell, and NATO troops were on the Oder-Niesse, but there must have been some improvements to these units, if only to give them a fighting chance?

  So, what improvements do we think they made?

• The first change I suspect they made was to get the OTK units trained up under the supervision of perhaps convalescing or otherwise disabled officers and NCOs fresh from the fighting against NATO in Germany. How well this went is up to some conjecture. But I suspect something better than 1940 LDV, and not quite as good as 1943 Home Guard might be a way to evaluate them. They're willing to fight, how well they will fight is an open question.
• Another was to improve the equipment available with whatever the Army was willing to spare (mostly cast-off or perhaps gear captured from the Chinese front! Though, I suspect there wasn't a ton of the latter.) I assume the Polish Army itself upgraded as follows:
• All of the RPG-2s are replaced by RPG-7.
• A limited number of 82mm M37 mortars were issued from reserve stocks. 
• All the SMGs are replaced by AKMR or AKMs 
• Limited replacement of ZPU-2 with ZU-23-2 as more are made available from new Soviet production. 
• The remaining B-10 RCLs are retired for more SPG-9s
• Each battalion is given a battery of 6 M37 82mm mortars.
• And this is my off the wall option, use it at your peril. As the NATO buildup in Germany continued over the winter of 1996-97,  the Polish government was deseperate to get any arms they could lay their hands on. One method they came up with was to release obsolete tanks to the OTK. Some 900 T-34/85s were released to the OTK from  reserve stocks as other army reserve and WOW units recieved T-55s as hand-me-downs from other army units. The vehicles were in bad shape, and often as not, encased in concrete and used as pillboxes ala the German Panzerturm, but...you could use them on the basis of one company per OTK Brigade or Regiment.

So, what would an OTK list look like? Well, not much different from an OTK list constructed for a 1980s game. They'd still be of fairly dubious quality, and with mostly light equipment, they'd have no business going toe-to-toe with anyone outside of an urban area or other close terrain. But in that terrain, with RPGs and RCLs, they could exact a high toll of NATO troops.

 TWILIGHT: 2000 POLISH OTK DEFENSE FORCE 

Quality: Marginal

Artillery Accuracy and Friction Response: 4+; Response 3+

Combat Formations

OT Infantry Battalion:

• Base:
• 1 SPG-9 73mm RCL Stand
• 1 82mm M37 Mortar Stand
• 3 Rifle Companies: 
• 3 Stands of Infantry

 OT Infantry Regiment:

• Base:
• 1 Traffic Regulation Platoon (treat as normal infantry stand) and 1 Truck
• 1 ZU-23-2 23mm Stand and 1 Truck
• 1 82mm M37 Mortar Stand
• 4-6 Rifle Companies:
• As per the battalion above, but each company has an 73mm SPG-9 stand.

Attachments

OT Brigade Engineer Battalion: 3 T-55 AVLB, 3 Truck Bridges

OT Brigade Engineer Company: 3 Engineer Stands and 3 Trucks

OT Brigade Smoke Laying Company: 1 Smoke Generator on Truck

OT Brigade Security Platoon: 1 ZU-23-2 Stand, 1 Truck

OT Armor Company: 2 T-34/85 (Polish player may only field one of these companies in a game).

__________________

So, this was an easy and short entry, but we'll cover individual divisions of the Polish Army, the WOW, and other units as I get to them. I am also going to show off my 6mm painting efforts and show you how I cracked the code to brush painting with AK. Figures I would crack that code after I made the decision not to buy any more of their products. 

TTFN!