The Other BALTAP Scenarios

[fitzpatv]

As promised, here's a summary of the other scenarios in the BALTAP set from the Community Pack.

Hunting in the Skaggerak 1983
This one involves a Soviet Sverdlov-class cruiser, two oilers and escorts trying to break through the Skaggerak to the North Sea. You have five Norwegian missile boats and two Kobben-class diesel subs with which to stop them. The Russians have Improved Styx missiles which outrange your Penguins and SAMs for defence against the latter if you get close enough to fire any. There are also Soviet submarines lurking about. You do have some help from a Nimrod patrol plane, but it is under AI control and does not behave optimally.

I played this more in hope than expectation. One of my subs was in the Skaggerak itself and I had it lie in wait, as deep as possible and motionless. It got lucky and the Soviet force passed over it without seeing it. Aware that there were also neutral Swedish vessels in the area, I went to periscope depth to positively identify the targets and managed to sink one of the oilers for 100 VP, also getting a Krivak by accident for 10 more. The sub then made its escape.

Only after this did the Nimrod see fit to take-off and she eventually re-located the enemy SSW of Kristiansand. My second Kobben had no chance of an intercept and, with a Minor Victory in the bag, I chose not to risk my Hauk missile boats.

OK, but not exactly memorable and my success owed much to good fortune.

Minesweeping Kiel Bight 1983
In this one, the Soviets have mounted a surprise attack and West Germany’s Baltic Fleet is ordered to evacuate to the Kattegat, N of the Danish Islands. Russian subs have laid minefields to hinder this retreat, so you need to use German minesweepers, of which you have 20, to clear the way. The destroyers Lutjens and Moelders are already at sea to provide ASW and short-ranged SAM cover and an oiler and a diesel sub are also SE of the Danish Belts. In port, you have 10 torpedo craft, 5 auxiliaries and another 13 SSKs, awkwardly grouped together. A total of 14 Starfighters and 4 Phantoms (all with rear-aspect Sidewinders) can be used as CAP and you have a Nike Hercules and three I-HAWK SAM sites.

Against this, the Warsaw Pact field their Whiskey V subs, a flotilla of East German Osa boats and a formidable air fleet with Acrid and Aphid AAMs, Kitchen anti-shipping missiles and Kyle ARMs, with Goa and Guideline sites lining the Baltic’s S coastline.

Theoretically, you win by moving ships to an Escape Zone, but nothing I got there scored me anything. Possibly you only score for what remains at the end of the scenario, but I didn’t get that far.

Initial air battles cost us an auxiliary, two torpedo boats and 22 SAM elements for 10 Fencers, a Fishbed and a Badger G, none of this scoring any points either way.

Moelders then detected and sank a Whiskey V with an ASROC, which likewise scored nothing.

U-13 was lost to a mine, which did at least tell us where some of them were. Several ships had been damaged by the initial strikes and weren’t going anywhere fast.

Lutjens fought-off a Styx attack by an Osa, then U-27 found and sank a second Whiskey.

A second air wave then came-in and was intercepted by CAP and SAMs. Lutjens was sunk by a Kitchen and we otherwise lost an F-104 for 4 Fishbeds, 3 Foxbats and 10 more Fencers. Our Phantoms turned-out to have no reloads at their base and had to divert to the Starfighter airfield to get some.

It seemed to be a case of ‘Damn the Mines’ and get out before everything was sunk in port by Kitchens. One of these soon put down a minesweeper, but we did dispose of three Badgers as the raids continued.

What seemed to be part of the Escape Zone, relatively close to port, turned-out to score us no points, so I altered course, having to risk the Osa squadron, who were covering that route. The Styxes proved relatively susceptible to chaff (80% spoof chance), so we got past them with just one torpedo boat lost. The rain of Kitchens was another matter and, out of SAMs, the Lutjens followed the Moelders to a watery grave.

Nothing reaching the Escape Zone was scoring any points and, when I somehow lost most of my remaining subs and torpedo boats to causes unknown (the mines?), I decided enough was enough.

Possibly, I overestimated the risk to my ships in port and should have left them there until I’d cleared the mines. I may try this again sometime. Otherwise, I have no idea how to win this scenario.

Mining Fehmarn Belt 1983
This one didn’t look too promising, but actually provided quite a good game. With tensions rising but no actual conflict yet, the West Germans and Danes decide to lay mines in the Fehmarn Belt and Sound at the S entrance to the Danish Belts. Getting wind of this, the Warsaw Pact warn that they will react to such a move with minesweeping and then send a convoy through to assert freedom of navigation. Your orders are to get the mines laid, then somehow protect them from enemy minesweepers without triggering hostilities.

You have one purpose-built minelayer, the Sachsenwald and three fast patrol boats with mines and Exocets to mine the Belt and the Sound, respectively. Backing them up are the destroyer Lutjens, two U-boats and the patrol craft Thetis, which has ASW capability. In the air, you are given 8 Tornadoes with a mix of all-aspect Sidewinders and Kormoran anti-shipping missiles, as well as two Breguet ASW patrol planes. Some radars, I-HAWK SAMs and SOSUS installations are also at your disposal.

Most of the Warsaw Pact ships are East German and Polish frigates, Osa boats and minesweepers. The Russian convoy is escorted by a Kashin with Improved Styxes and Goas and Petya ASW corvettes. Poland has the Sokol, a Whiskey-class sub. Enemy air assets include Flogger B fighters with Apex missiles (which outrange your Sidewinders), Fishbed attack planes, Badger OECM aircraft and May patrol planes. As usual in these scenarios, the S Baltic coast bristles with Guidelines, Goas and radars.

With neutral shipping about, I wondered whether anyone had warned them about the mines!. It turned-out that neutral losses don’t cost any points.

I soon detected some East German minesweepers and the frigate Rostock, but none of them do anything in the early stages. Laying the mines was straightforward enough, though you have to specify the missions yourself and be careful about the arming times of the mines. With this done, I had one missile boat cover the Sound and everything else the Belt, as the latter was much the likeliest course for the convoy. Sachsenwald was told to get well to the rear once her work was done.

After seven-and-a-half hours, the Warsaw Pact initiated minesweeping. Despite my misgivings, this was actually handled rather well. Each time a WP vessel hits a mine, there is a chance of hostilities breaking out. They go about it in a rather bull-at-a-gate way, so it wasn’t long before this happened, by which stage two of their minesweepers were damaged (the mines are none too lethal).

I’d been tracking the Sokol, which was inside the minefield in the Belt, so the duty Breguet duly disposed of her. Some of the minesweepers had pushed suicidally forward and were sunk by gunfire. Tornadoes launched Kormorans and got rid of two Polish and two East German Osa boats. All ships score 10 VP. Meanwhile, two Floggers damaged the retiring Breguet, but fell foul of Lutjens’s SAMs for 3 points each.

Two waves of MiG-21s sank the missile boat Puma, costing me 20 VP, but lost seven of their number to fighters, SAMs and AA. One Tornado was lost to a freak shot from a Guideline (01 on 7% chance) despite being at low altitude, which cost 6 VP. The tally of eliminated minesweepers reached ten and the Polish frigate Warszawa was damaged by Exocets as she approached the Belt.

The convoy moved-up towards the minefields and the missile boat Hermelin sank one of the escorting Petyas with an Exocet. As the two merchantmen and their accompanying Kashin entered the mined area, both were damaged. Lurking behind the barrier, U-13 finished-off one of the merchant vessels. Tornadoes then returned for another strike and put away the Kashin and the Warszawa. They also hit a fishing boat by mistake, but this cost no points. U-23 then moved-up and sank the other merchant vessel. With a stray MiG-21 falling to a Tornado, it ended in a Triumph, with a score of +354.

Not a particularly difficult scenario. While the Pact has a lot of force available, it isn’t very well handled and can be beaten fairly comfortably given a positive but sensibly cautious approach.

Close Down Mukran 1987
This is one of those small-scale submarines-only scenarios that I’m not overfond of. A limited war has broken-out in 1987, with the Warsaw Pact declaring the Baltic E of a line between Arkona and Trelleborg out-of-bounds to NATO shipping. Unrest in Poland has hindered the USSR’s efforts to rush reinforcements and supplies to East Germany, so they are bringing them via Czechoslovakia and by sea. In the latter case, this means offloading at the harbours of Sassnitz and Mukran, where there is a specialised loading bridge for double-decker railway ferries. NATO has decided to mine the entrances to these ports and mount a special ops raid to destroy the loading bridge.

In each case, the job will be done by a pair of U-Boats, carrying both mines and US Navy SEALs. For good measure, a Soviet convoy is expected 18 hours in and you are encouraged (optionally) to attack it with torpedoes. To help with this, it is possible to use a Special Action (while at periscope depth) to call-in some Danish missile boats. You also have the strictly theoretical assistance of a Nimrod and a Breguet, but they are under AI control and go AWOL over the Atlantic for lengthy periods, so don’t expect much.

There are numerous hazards lying in wait, from frigates and corvettes to mines to ASW choppers and patrol planes. It is quite an ask to expect two diesel subs to reach the target area, lay mines where indicated, then land the SEALs, wait, extract them and get away (even without risking the convoy attack), all in dangerously shallow water and with a need to go to periscope depth every few hours to get potential updates. As is usual with such scenarios, you only need to be unlucky once.

I gave it a go regardless. After some initial sub-surface contacts proved predictably biological, I detected a couple of East German Tarantul boats and, as they totally lacked sonar and ASW weapons, steered through them on the basis that nothing nastier was that likely to be nearby.

This turned-out not to be quite the case, as another enemy warship appeared from the W and seemed to be taking an interest in U-29, my lead boat. I tried being stealthy, but eventually lost my nerve and torpedoed it, to find that it was a moderately dangerous Rostock-class frigate. It scored no points.

Some Haze ASW choppers were around, but I steered away from them as best I could. Especially as I was moving unavoidably into shallow water of 60-70’ depth, I couldn’t hope to evade detection indefinitely.

A second patrolling warship then appeared to have U-29’s number, so I again had recourse to a torpedo, this time sinking an East German Wismar corvette, another relatively low-capability platform.

Shortly after detecting a pair of minesweepers N of the headland near Sassnitz and less than 10nm from the area where she was supposed to lay her mines, U-29 (moving at 5 knots and as deep as she could get, at night in thick weather) was assailed by a Haze that made straight for her from outside the range of its dipping sonar. It was a foregone conclusion and the loss of the sub cost me 150 VP. Seeing no chance of winning, I quit at this point.

Did nothing wrong here but was sunk anyway. Frankly, it’s a suicide mission and you need to be very lucky indeed to get any kind of victory here.