Or simply swap 3rd and 4th Marine Divisions. Intresting idea. As for an ACR, there was talk in some of the old Armor Journals about adding additional ACRs to the Army in the late 80's; the numbers they were talking was 6th, 10th and 14th. No idea if these were the planned numbers, but all three have been former ACRs through the 50s-60s...so, reasonable assumption would go for those three.

So Australia might commit a brigade, reinforced by anything from New Zealand?

Don't see any British commitment, short of moving the 6th Division over from Chinese control when Eighth Army reached the Yalu River. We were reacing to get something meaningful for the MEFF.

It is possible that Canada might furnish a battalion/brigade group, but we run into the same thing as far as force structure goes.

A member of my local gaming group suggested Japan might furnish a division or two for Korea, aside from the issues with the Japanese constitution, there is also the memories for the Koreans of the last time the Japanese were on the peninsula so I really doubt any troops from that source....any thoughts?

IMO, the Japanese could easily do that, and perhaps the Koreans have forgiven them enough to let it go, but are the ROKs really that hard-pressed? From what little I've read, the South Koreans can handle the North Koreans in a straight-up fight. The two US corps may even be overkill?

The problem is the Japanese Constitution, they are forbidden to dispatch military units outside of Japan. The unit that went to Iraq was a medical/engineer/security task force....and its deployment almost caused the fall of the government at that time, only its humanitarian mission saved it.

The deployment of a Japanese Destroyer to take part in the anti-piracy patrols also caused a lot of debate. The ROE it has to operate under is supposed to be the toughest one of any naval unit deployed, or so I'm told by a squid just returning from his reserve deployment there.

As for the ROK armed forces...tough little bastards by all accounts, discipline is high, training is strict and as realistic as possible...and the South Koreans outnumber the North Koreas by almost 2.5 to one, especially once all the reserves get called up. The sole purpose of the 2nd Infantry Division was as a symbol of UN/US commitment to maintain South Korea...at least in the timeframe of the game.

While I acknowledge that the North Korean goverment certainly marches to the beat of its own, insane drummer...would they try an attack on the ROK? Their biggest supporter is China with only limited Soviet support. If anything, I would think that the PRK would try to maintain a more neutral stance, at least until they could see a clear winner in the Sino-Soviet match.

And that means why would so many divisions be committed to Korea when they are so badly needed elsewhere? Food for thought...

Sorry, I wasn't thinking clearly-- by "easily" I meant that they didn't have any pressing use for those forces on their own islands. I can't remember reading of any invasion there. {Probably lots of NK/Soviet commando hits, though.}

Indeed. If anything, the ROKs could be sending divisions to the Chinese.

Yeah I know I have heard of the 10th and 14th ACRs in the past.

Any ideas what the the Army plans were for their 6th and 21st Air Combat Cavalry Brigade. Did they have ground dismounts? The reason I ask is that US Vehicle guide shows the 6th ACCB with an Artillery Battalion. I know the 6th ACCB was more of the active unit of the two Brigade while the other was filled from other units. Both were based out of Fort Hood, until the 6th ACCB was moved to Korea as part of the 8th US Army.

Then with this Brigade how did they compare to the Aviation Brigades such as the 11th and 12th Aviation Brigade that were based with V and VII Corps in Germany and the 66th Aviation Brigade which I recall was largely a NG/Reserve formation for I Corps. I am assuming the the 6th ACCB had similar role being assigned to the III Corps. Ironically I can't recall the XVIII Airborne Corps aviation brigade...

14th ACR was, I believe, the last active duty ACR on the books besides the ones everyone is familiar with (when 11th ACR's colors came out of Vietnam, 14th ACR in Europe was reflagged as 11th).

Personally, I'd scrap VI Corps entirely and put all the troops in theater under II Corps and II MAF. Army units can serve under USMC higher headquarters and vice versa without drama, has been happening regularly since way before the current modularity vogue.

I can't see 3rd MarDiv going to Korea -- the war is won or lost based on possession of Middle Eastern oil. If the North Korean screaming hordes overrun South Korea and do a lemming job right on into the ocean it really means very little in the big picture, but Soviet airborne forces dropping on Riyadh means folks in Iowa either start learning the words to Internationale or the war goes very nuclear very quick to stave off inevitable defeat.

In addition, there's unlikely to be any rush to saturate Korea with foreign forces in terms of the circumstances anyway. On full mobilization the ROKA fields something like 40 divisions in the Twilight timeline, with all the bells and whistles of Corps/Army assets and SOF units. As I've stated previously, 2nd Korean War won't be a replay of the 1st War, and the North Koreans won't be rolling hellbent for leather for Pusan with the only hope being US or UN forces. With the Russians churning through China they're not going to be able to spare large concentrations to help the North Koreans until China completely collapses (and even then their hands will be tied to an extent holding anything they try to keep).

A reinforcing role for US/UN forces would likely only come into play if the plan was to go over onto the offensive against the DPRK, with at least some intent to change the Chinese/Russian equation and pull some Russian troops off the Chinese. This only matters at all after the Middle East is secured and if Europe is relatively stable.

I think that was mentioned in the Challenge article about Canada, with a brigade group being readied for service in Korea getting diverted to Alaska. I don't see Canada going in for a two front war with the dual burden of battle casualty replacements for Europe and bringing their reserves into a workable state. And, in a universe where the Soviets have the capability to actually mount an invasion of Alaska, a Canadian brigade group being opconned to USARAK seems rather more likely than lobbing them across the Pacific to Korea.

Currently Australia has only two Divisions, with the 2nd made up of about 99% reservists and the 1st about 30% (give or take). Neither is intended to be deployed as a whole.
9 BDE could have been sent to Korea even though likely needed at home to defend against Indonesian landing efforts in an attempt to bring the US on board at least diplomatically (yes, I am aware of the ANZUS treaty obligations) - the US teetering on the bring of abandoning the treaty due to their entanglement on multiple pre-existing fronts (Europe, Korea, Middle East). 9 BDE may have freed up US assets more suited to the tropics than the Australian brigade (perhaps a few warships, a squadron of fighters, etc).

It's a stretch I know, but I like the idea of Australians involved in both rounds of the Korean War. The Koreans make fairly good substitute Russians too for those back home interested in the idea of payback for nuking the world.

I don't know much about the New Zealand military, however my thoughts are they are more likely to be involved against Indonesia than Korea (ANZUS treaty obligations). Their FV101 Scorpions would prove a match against the fairly light armour of the Indonesians but chewed up and spat out by North Korean T-55s.

I'm not an expert on the NZ military either, although I am a Kiwi so I know where to look for info. From recent historical evidence, a large deployment out of NZ is unlikely. We simply don't have the capabilities to support a large operation out-of-country; we generally piggy-back off of others.

The way I see it, the first Asian front to kick off (say, Korea) would get some NZers, especially if Aus sent troops. First in would be the SAS, and probably a medical detachment, and some Hercs doing support work. If there was a larger need, regular troops would come a bit later (would likely need training and reserve call-up).

Then if Indonesia went off, much of that might get called home, or to Australia, to support from there. The Navy would lend some support, likely a frigate joining the Aussies. And we still had a combat airforce then, so No. 2 Squadron (upgraded Skyhawks) would probably be helping too (No. 2 was equipped with ex-Royal Aus. Navy A4s, and based in NSW, Aus. in the 90's).

All up, I would say a squadron of SAS, a battalion of regulars (after training), some support troops, a few Hercs, a frigate and No. 2 Squadron would all that would end up outside of NZ.

Oh, and we kinda got booted out of ANZUS over that whole "no nukes" thing :) Wonder if Marsden Point oil refinery received some attention nevertheless.....

Andrew

GDW dropped the ball on the artillery battalion attached to 6ACCB, the only place I could anywhere that even mentions doing this was an article in the Field Artillery Journal that talked about assigning a MLRS battalion to them for Deep Strike Missions. This is the only place this has ever been mentioned.

The make up of 6ACCB during the Twilight period was four "cavalry" squadrons (none of which had 6th Cavalry) that were renamed attack helicopter battalions. Unlike the 11th/12th Aviation Brigades which have General Support (OH-58C), a Combat Support (UH-60), a attack helicopter (AH-64) and a medium helicopter (CH-47) battalions.

III Corps for the REFORGER role was always intended as the counter attack force, thats why it had two armored divisions (1st Cavalry and 2nd) as well as the 6ACCB.

Evil Grin...the name of the XVIII Airborne Corps Aviation Brigade, is the 18th Aviation Brigade.....setup was the same as 11th/12th, but lacked the CH-47 battalion.

I remember reading in a Infantry Journal that New Zealand's commitment to Korea was a infantry company and a artillery battery, to be attached to a Australian deployment, this was back in 76/77...

Silly 18th Airborne Corps...Funny how lot of their support were called 18th..... You would think since I posted at Fort Bragg I would remember this, oh wait a minute I was off Division land. It is strange how Corps, Division, and Special Forces were separated by common uniform...lol

Yeah about III Corps it funny that in the States it had 4 Armor Division (2 posing as Mechanized Divisions, with only 2 Divisions having full compliment of units on active duty with these having one Brigade each Forward Deployed) with one Mechanized Division. Yeah I know two of these Division were due to go to the V and VII Corps once they got over there and their equipment. The thing is when the III Corps was fully over there the US Army Europe would have 3 Corps with each with 2 Armor Divisions, 1 Mechanized Division, 1 Armor Cavalry Regiment, and 1 Aviation Brigade of some type.

Another thing I find ironic is that the 3rd Armor and 1st Cavalry were set up with 3 Armor Brigades instead of 2 Armor and 1 Mechanized Brigades.

Like I said, the 194th and 197th as well as the two Brigades from the 24th Mechanized Division would be sent in place of the Round Out Brigades and these Brigades would be used to make other units.

Much like part of the plan with Light Infantry Division was to ship out new Infantry Brigades thrown together at Benning from the Infantry School paired up with other Artillery and Support units to help bring these Divisions up to manpower requirements.

*Shrug*

Considering that the 1st Cavalry and 2nd Armored were organized per the pure Division 86 configuration, that is 6 armd and 4 mech battalions. The intent was to have two tank heavy brigades (2 and 1) and one balanced brigade (2 and 2).

Both divisions, along with the 1st and 4th Mechanized Divisions badly needed the roundout brigades, but even the most conservative estimate had them not ready for 30-60 days; so the feeding in of the 194th Armd, 197th Mech into the two armored divisions made plenty of sense.

The "German" divisions; 1st and 3rd Armored Divisions, 3rd and 8th (and the old 4th) Mechanized Infantry Divisions used a modified TO&E. For the armored divisions it was six armored and 5 mech battalions and for the mech divisions it was the exact opposite.

Yeah, it was one of those things seeing what GDW had publish, what was actually in the Army OOB at the time, even until after 1991 makes one wonder if something had happen where the US wasn't fighting on two fronts, but several more, where they would come up with the manpower to do so...

Hmm, I'm thinking the NZ Battalion would replace one of the two Australian infantry battalions in the Korea brigade with the personel of the 2nd Australian battalion rolled over into the first to make up numbers....

Conscription. Lots and lots of conscription.
Post nuke the military may even be seen by many as the one sure way of putting food in your belly. You might find many, many volunteers post nuke both for this and paying back the "Reds" for nuking their friends and families.

Sadly, I am reminded of a man-in-street interview in New York City on 9/11...the reporter asked his subject what his feelings were concerning the fall of the twin towers and the reports that terrorists were responsible. The response chilled me...."The United States deserves this for our criminal support of Israel and our oppression of the Arab peoples."

Just how many people will say that the Soviets were justified in using nukes on the US.......

There will definitely be some who feel that way, but unlike 911, the US will have a year or more in which to flood the media with propaganda. I rather doubt many would be all that sympathetic towards the enemy powers.

You forget that it is the enemy who resorts to propaganda, the Allies have "sources of information" to remember a famous line from WWII. ;)

Considering the "TraLaLaLa Land" that some of my fellow citizens dwell in, I do find it reasonable to believe that a percentage of the population will protest the war, actively support the Soviet position and may actually make an effort to sabotage the war effort. It happened in World War Two, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, Grenada, Panama, Desert Storm, the various peacekeeping missions in the former Yugoslavia, Iraq, Afghanistan, and there rumblings on the internet about Libya. Now why on earth would those people change their stripes?

And yes I am including those who live in the People's Republic of California! Don't forget that a certain city located near a certain bay has taken out city ordnances protesting the US involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan, not to mention banning pet stores as well as the sale of certain fast food items in their foggy city....a rather infamous university there is noted as a hot bed of extremism, there is a running joke that the frequent earthquakes that rattle the area may also be causing severe brain trauma!

Besides, their outlook is another great tool for a GM. Just picture the player's party running a recon mission against the invading Mexican Army stumbling over a line of Berkley students protesting the US policy against illegals!

Given how the Twilight War involves some sort of murky circumstances I could see how a percentage of folks in western democracies would be critical of the NATO entry into the war and feel that the Warsaw Pact was the victim of aggression. How prevalent? Good question. Post nukes it might not be an opinion to express too loudly in mixed company, but could also be a rallying point for antigovernment types trying to step into the power vacuum.

Obviously a good justification for a brutal dictatorship and incendiary weapons. :p

So basically you would have MilGov, CivGov, New America, the various independent warlords and bandits and then you would have the various anti-Nuke, anti-military, anti-US involvement overseas, anti-early morning cartoons, anti-McDonalds and anti-ad nasuem.

Like I said, lots of things for a GM to through at the players.

Sounds like life as normal in the US. ;)

There was always a running joke along the lines of instead of taking the right turn into Fort Irwin and the National Training Center...just hang a left and introduce UC-Berkerly to the joys of a full scale armor assault!!!

:p

We do kind of resemble that. Now all we need is a couple of talking heads to tell everyone how it should be done and we are set!

Shouldn't that be heads that disagree how it's to be done? :)

Sounds reasonable. Where Australia goes New Zealand also tends to go, with a smaller troop commitment commensurate with its smaller military.

12/40 RTR might be the better unit to stay on with 10/27 RSAR being split up.
Why? Basically because 12/40 has more people on the books than 10/27.

I thought at the time the 1st Mechanized was much like the 2nd Armored with 1 Brigade Forward Deployed with the remainder of the Division at Fort Riley, KS.

Yeah we GDW had all active heavy units listed 6-5 scale if I recall correctly...*Shrug* Then again it didn't help that the 1st and 4th Mechanized were more or less Armored Divisions.

I have always been interested in the speculated deployments of places like Hungary, Austria, Czech, and other Pact Nations in more detail. I never got around to purchase the Eastern Europe Sourcebook. Gee wonder why they never made on for Korea... *shrug* or for that matter sundry places like Scandinavia/Iceland/Greenland, Canada/Alaska, South Pacific, anything Africa, or anything south of the US Border...lol

Even Balkan region with Italy, Greece, Turkey, Romanian, and such would of been nice to have. Or one dealing with Spain and Portugal with maybe France would of been nice. Even the Baltic States, Ukraine, and Georgia with some of her more interesting neighbors would have been nice. India Sub continent and China would of been treasures too. I know it seems like lot of material, but for how fast they were cranking this stuff out, and the thing they alluded too, would have made the game more complete in my opinion...

1st MID had their 3rd Brigade forward deployed to VII Corps, it was a 2-n-1 mix. But the war role of 1st MID had it going to III Corps with its role in NORTHAG...I always heard that 3rd Brigade would be chopped to 3rd MID, so that would leave a two brigade division up north...hence the talk of cross-attaching 194th/197th or a yet to be named NG Brigade.

There was some talk about a Korea Sourcebook, but then came the PG1 Sourcebook and then the disaster with the follow-up sourcebook leaving the company with a major cash-flow problem (their contract with WalMart required them to buy back any unsold sourcebooks; can we say goat-screwed?), and just as they were recovering, along came Magic the Gathering and the death of the old wargaming side of the hobby.

Don't get me wrong MoG is a fun, pretty game for the munckins and when the hobby stores had the choice of buying collectible card games and getting the rapid return or buying traditional games and watching them gather dust on the shelf, can't blame them for going for profit.

But it is still such a shame that so many great companies fell to the wayside.

Well, that and reality caught up with the timeline, which left the game kind of troubled -- and ushered in a serious decline in quality of product for the regional sourcebooks compared to the v1.0 stuff.

I think all of the above would have been pretty good stuff, if done right. I suspect that a big part of the problem was that the NATO/WP WW3 scenario had been so endlessly researched, talked about, documented, etc., that in the pre internet era you could still walk into a decent sized public library and do all the research you needed to generate something like USAVG or its Soviet equivalent.

Finding hard and precise order of battle info for Africa, South America, etc., was probably significantly more difficult in those days (still kind of is today, even with local military history enthusiasts from a lot of those nations devotedly updating and expanding wikipedia entries, etc.).

Still, would have been cool to see what GDW would have produced had they had access to 2011 (or even 2000) era internet resources for research. It seemed like, from the level of detail they put into African political geography in the 2300 game, that at least some folks with the company had a major interest in events in that part of the world. I suspect a T2K Africa sourcebook would have been a pretty well done project.

Well with lot of African nations they usual had a couple Brigades worth of troop if lucky, while others had mere Battalion worth of troops. Again this was always in flux with various rebellions too.

Yeah the XVIII Airborne Corps was always complex on where they would head too. On one hand they were considered a Reserve, on another hand they had the two Divisional size units that could be rapidly deployed to low intensity conflict. On the other hand every other combat unit that was suppose to make up the Corps besides these two could end up in Europe just as easily as Central Command AO. Even with that said, the Corps could end up almost anywhere in the world.

10th Mountain, 6th Light, 9th Motorized, and 24th Mechanized could of ended up almost anywhere during the conflict. Do I see 6th Light go to Norway. Uhm no way, and I don't see them leaving for Korea. Maybe moving a one of their two Brigades to Korea yes, but otherwise the Division HQ, 1 combat Brigade, Aviation Brigade, and Support stay put in Alaska and the they take over command of many of the Alaska Nation Guard units. 10th Mountain I see going to Norway. 9th and 24th well I see them being used to supply manpower to US Europe first. Not sure where in Europe but probably there.

The thing is after the 1st Cavalry, 2nd Armor, 1st Mechanized, 4th Mechanized, 5th Mechanized, 9th Motorized, and 24th Mechanized Divisions as well the 194th Armor Brigade and 197th Mechanized Brigade are shipped out as well as the 3rd Armor Cavalry Regiment. I can see new units being raised to with the equipment that they left. With that said, of course all the Division would need another Brigade, but if you take 194th and 197th replacement and assign them one of the 7 new divisions. Then all you need in another 5 round-out Brigades and assign them to the other 5 Divisions to bring them up to strength. This could give you the 4th Armor Division, 6th Armor Division, 3 other newly name Armor/Mechanized Divisions as well the 9th and 24th Division being reconstituted. Of these I see a few of these going to Europe while the bulk head to Central Command to give the 3rd Army some teeth, if not to the 8th Army.

Also I can see units like the 11th, 13th, and 17th Airborne/Air Assault/Airmobile Divisions being organized various places. 11th possible in Korea with 1 Airborne and 1 Air Assault Brigade to start off with. The 13th at Campbell and 17th at Bragg trying to raise new units, but with XVIII Corps loses everywhere they none of these Division get much beyond 2 specialized Brigades, Aviation, and Support with maybe Mechanized or Heavy Motorized Brigade added.

Again back to the 82nd, 101st and any other Light Division with Central Command in the Middle East or Europe. I can see these Divisions giving up one combat Brigade to Heavy Division for a Heavy Brigade to give them some teeth.

Just some thought

I don't see the war lasting long enough for significant new formations to be raised -- not while the US is trying to sustain high intensity operations on 3+ fronts.

All the stuff left by units that punched out for POMCUS sites wasn't bonus waiting for new guys to fall in on it, it would have been right into the pipeline for the equipment side of battle casualty replacements. And equipment losses on the European front by itself would be staggering compared to what we've seen in the '91 and '02 iterations redecorating the Cradle of Civilization. Likewise guys rolling through the initial training pipeline -- most would be individual replacements bound for units already in theater, not set aside for new units. The handful of new or rebuilt from the ground up units depicted in T2K are probably a reasonable estimation of what would be feasible while simultaneously keeping units in theater(s) combat effective.

The whole WW3 situation isn't a replay of World War Two -- the logistics of wartime production of everything from M1 tanks to aircraft to modern munitions is significantly more complicated and much more bottlenecked. You can't farm out Bradley or M1 production to the Saturn car plant in Tennessee and such as was routinely done in WW2 stuff -- and even if you could, the war goes nuclear in less than 12 months, which isn't enough time for much of that to happen at all even for stuff that has an easier cross over.

What we're presented with in the books is, granted, chaotic, but when looked at closely, it makes sense. Units were sent where they were desperately needed, when they were needed and as the transportation was available. Yes the "correct" units may not have gone where they could have been the most effective, but since when has a plan ever survived five minutes past implementation?

It's my opinion that the OOB's as published, while far from perfect, are a damn fine example of the chaos a multi-front war will create. We can talk all we want about how to "fix" it, but when it all boils down, "fixing" really only radically changes the balance of power in the various regions and simply doesn't reflect what would truly happen if WWIII happened to break out.

True enough granted if there was no time between the time when the fighting starts and when US, UK, and other NATO members enter the fighting. Then yeah lot of the stuff would be either used to re-equip NG and Reserves as they were called up. With the build up that GDW gives us, even the US Military would have enough time to cycle a couple rotation through Basic Training and in some MOS people underway in the AIT. Of course these units would pay hell once they enter combat, but rotate them up front to fill holes in some of the Divisions already in combat while this Brigade or that were withdrawn to get rest and refit...


Such MOS like Medics, Ranger Training, and Q Course (along with other Special Operation units course) wouldn't have enough time to train to expand. Yet once the shooting war starts Rangers school will be shorten to get more qualified Rangers for the Regiment and for line units. Same with Special Forces in many cases the Teams will go through the initial training and more intensive shorten training to get them ready.

Of course, after TDM there will be plenty of Ranger trained and Special Operation trained units that will be shifted around for disaster relief duty when it becomes clears that sending reinforcement is no longer a real option. With many of the Special Operation teams you can create various recovery teams around these type of units.

Just some thought...