Adventure seed/story-time/game-fic based on the Going Home handout...

[raketenjagdpanzer]

As always, use and abuse.

General Smith gazed out his headquarters office window at the Bremerhaven port. The harbor was a dismal mess of half-sunken wrecks (some of the wrecks US Navy ships that had limped, crippled by torpedo and cruise missile fire, into the harbor never to sail again) and neglected heavy equipment.

It's been three years since the bombs, and the damn harbor looks a thousand years old he mused.

Despite this, the harbor would soon come alive. He'd spent the day at a classified briefing that was almost unbelievable: the United States military was going home. Not in bits and pieces on tramp freighters, but as a single unit. Enough fuel-oil had been found to power the remnants of the merchant fleet that could be scraped together along Germany's northern coast, and the orders were clear: get everyone home, soonest.

But "soonest" meant sometime before the North Atlantic was wracked with winter storms - which were almost entirely unpredictable since the last GOES-8 weather satellite had quit working sometime in 1998 - and the military was forced to either fight, starve, or become farmers wholesale to survive in Europe.

The decision to move brought its own difficulties, though. The US military consisted now of no cohesive units outside of Germany (and those were questionably organized). Instead, divisions which just three years ago would have been considered brigades were strung out from northern Poland all the way to southwestern Romania. An entire US Marine RCT with two companies of armor was at last report somewhere in Bulgaria. Thousands of men (and women) had hundreds of miles to cross to get to the port. This was only the beginning of the difficulty, though. The trip across the Atlantic would "only" take a week, perhaps ten days with a fleet layover off of Dover. During this time, food would be an issue. The German government was being incredibly generous giving up a treasure trove of fuel in exchange for perhaps a thousand half broken-down armored vehicles of all stripes. The Bundeswehr liaison had made it quite clear that use of the ships, the harbor and the fuel was as far as they could go. Getting seven days' food for perhaps fifty to fifty-five thousand troops on top of all of that was simply impossible.

OPORD: Omega (as it was being called) couldn't order every soldier to pack a week's groceries or starve. Smith rubbed his forehead as he contemplated the outbreaks of food related violence and beyond if the troops weren't kept fed at sea for a week. The Germans themselves might riot if fifty thousand eager to travel US troops decided to help themselves to crops, the few store goods left, and so on.

...

Smith worked into the night, going over notes and maps - many if not most were hopelessly out of date. Still, every avenue had to be pursued. He finally narrowed his search down to a single folder of maps and notes. He tapped the red dot that indicated where Fehmarn was - had been - and began to make his own notes.

...POMCUS site...many railroads...no contact since '99...possibility? yes, best

He made note to contact the commander of 2-42 armored reconnaissance. They had a drive to take, tomorrow morning.

...

This is a short Twilight:2000 scenario titled OPERATION: VITTLES. The timeframe is two months prior to OpOrd: Omega. The scenario is, if you couldn't tell by that bit of creative writing, that thousands of pounds of food are required for TF34 to be successful. The general in question (mentioned in the Opord Omega handout) is tasked with getting enough support and logistics (including food!) together for the voyage. During the rapid advances and successes of US and German forces, to keep supply lines from becoming stretched too thin additional POMCUS sites were established and material was shifted forward to them. It is the General's hope that the one at Fehmarn hasn't been completely stripped since due to its proximity to both railroads and seaports it was a vital location for food distribution.

The reality is both good and bad: most of the food is intact (more than enough to fill a few railcars or an entire convoy of trucks) and there is plenty for the task. The bad part comes in trying to get it over 150 miles of iffy German terrain without being noticed! Also, survivors in the towns around Fehmarn aren't completely ignorant of what is in the warehouses near the "bombed town"...consequently there is a large bandit contingent ready to pounce should anyone deny them their considerable stockpile of loot!

Fehmarn itself suffered a single slightly off-target 300kt groundburst - enough to spare the POMCUS warehouses and at least a little of the city from total destruction. The foodstuffs themselves have been undamaged by fallout, as most drifted out to sea to the east and north. Late in November of 1997, the Soviets "salted the wound" by conventional bombings of the town, as well as laying down cluster-bomb delivered mines in an effort to deny the port to NATO troops, at least for a while.

Consequently the city is a no-man's land of minefields, bomb craters and fallout zones occupied by the toughest and most ruthless individuals.

Getting in is easy, getting out with 30 tons of food is the real trick...

[raketenjagdpanzer]

Part II: Local history.

During the initial conventional phases of the War, POMCUS sites were heavily bombarded by the Soviets and Warsaw Pact forces. SCUD missiles with both conventional and biological/chemical wareheads were used extensively, as were conventionally armed cruise missiles and on occasion direct air attack with all the aforementioned weapons. The liberal use of chemical and biological agents, and the earlier mentioned use of area denial munitions made cities and towns near POMCUS sites (and the sites themselves) extremely unpopular for all but the most desperate looters once the war escalated into a nuclear exchange.

Likewise, the cities and towns in the areas near POMCUS sites were devastated. Most people, fearing the manifold dangers that such attacks entailed, fled into the less populated countryside. However five years after the start of the war, and three years after heavy nuclear bombardment, braver and more determined factions are eying the supply depots and beginning to weigh the risks worth taking...

[There are several Geomorph map products for Twilight:2000 that can be used to generate the outlying towns and the city popular for this adventure]

FACTIONS:

Currently the area around Fehmarn; these can be added to or subtracted from as the GM sees fit.

GERMAN FORCES: The FRG forces spearheaded the attacks into East Germany to help liberate the country, and then again held the north flank of NATO attacks into Poland and were thus spread very thin for the majority of the war. "Home Guard" Bundeswehr units were given little thought; most assumed that the Soviets would capitulate or be completely destroyed long before now. Consequently a pre-war brigade strength unit now patrols a vast region that Fehmarn is included in. Nominal unit strength is:

400 troops
8 AFVs (3x Leopard IIs, 2x Kanonenjagdpanzer, 1x Raketenjagdpanzer, 2x Marder IFVs, 2x M113A3 APC)
10 various trucks, utility vehicles, etc.
1x M109A3 SPA + 1x M106A3 mortar carrier (for brigade fire support)

Although this seems like a very large amount of troops and armor, they are spread extremely thin through the area and while tactical mobility is good, moving as a cohesive whole is often difficult.

The unit's morale and loyalty to Germany are Very Strong, and Strong to NATO (specifically US units, but only Moderate to UK units).

They are headquartered in Grammsdorf. The HQ unit is approximately 25 personnel plus a security detail of 70, 2x GMC and 3x Iveco heavy trucks, 1x Leopard II. The artillery unit is organic to the command unit. Most other units are typically on patrol throughout the countryside and may be "randomly" encountered.

US FORCES:
Since the committing of most US forces to the 5th Division push into Poland, very few US forces are available in Germany. The aforementioned armored recon unit, however, is near Bremen and has the following strength:

2-42 ARMORED RECON:
155 troops
3x AFVs (1x Marder II, 1x BMP 2, 1x M3 Bradley)
3x Humvees (2x TOW armed, 1x ad-hoc M106 RR armed)
Nominally 1x AH-6 Little Bird - this last has enough AvGas for approx. 3 hrs. flight and is reserved for use in only the most dire circumstances. While it is nominally held for emergency evac, if the situation called for it it can be armed with 2x TOW missiles on a starboard mounting and 7x 2.75" FFARs on a port mounting. There are unit personnel capable of installing the weapons.

Although the unit acquitted itself well during the early stages of the war, the unit had to be withdrawn in early 1997 due to mounting losses but was never properly reconstituted. Consequently the command has been itching for a fight. This unit is nominally headquartered in Bremen, and has high Morale, and strong Loyalty to NATO allies across the board.

MARAUDERS:

Germany is, even after 1997, a fairly orderly place. However, marauders do exist. The worst of them is the Free People's Army (Friebundesarmee), a band that consists of disaffected Poles looking to avenge themselves on the Germans, East German deserters and Bundeswehr deserters and malcontents. It is possible a few ex-NATO troops may be in their mix as well.

Rough strength is:

100 personnel
2x AFV (1x BMP-2, 1x M113)
8x vehicles in various conditions
25 +/- prisoners, camp followers, etc. There is a 2% chance there may be an important figure (politician, military type, western diplomat) being held hostage. The Freibundesarmee is scattered through the ruins of Fehmarn, and has turned many of the air-dropped mines into nasty booby traps throughout the ruin.

THE ADVENTURE

Getting to Fehmarn should be fairly easy; Germans are nothing if not efficient in their clean-up and rebuilding efforts, and German civilians will brook little outlawry in general. However, given the desolation around the city proper, the entire area near Fehmarn (approx. 2km diameter, not counting the blast zone) is a no-go area. It is on the reconstructing German Government's "To-do" list...very, very far down on the list.

If the players encounter civilians near the Fehmarn area and the players discuss their orders, then said civilians may be plied with food and or supplies from the warehouses. If the unit does not, of course, no help will be forthcoming but operational security is thus maintained.

The situation in and near Fehmarn is desperate - FRG help is not forthcoming, and it is unlikely that the 100-200 civilians in the vicinity will survive another bitter winter. Given a chance to at least help for some of the food cache will make allies of all of them.

The Bundeswehr know of rumors of supplies in Fehmarn, but lack the resources to investigate given their operational area and suppression of bandits. Once such supplies are uncovered, as word gets out they themselves will investigate and may (or may not!) assist the PCs in getting the food transported back to Bremen...

A successful completion of the adventure means that the party has recovered most of the food and other supplies (approximately 20 tons of MREs, plus GM-decided amounts of fuel, ammunition, etc.) and found a way to transport it wholly back to Bremen. The most efficacious method would be to capture as many marauder vehicles as possible (most are larger trucks) and employ as many as the Bundeswehr can spare.

POSSIBLE ALTERNATE OUTCOMES:

"There's enough food...for us." - the players discover the food cache...but it's not nearly enough to share. The Germans in the region are starving, but the evacuees will be equally starved without the food that is available. Hard decisions will have to be made, for if the food is left behind the locals will now certainly loot all of it.

"There's nothing here, and there never was." (AKA "The Magical Misery Tour"). However USAREUR plans on feeding the troops on the way back home, it won't be this way. The warehouses are empty, or destroyed. Not even a wrapper from an MRE remains, only a few pitiful barrels of spoiled fuel and a box or two of mismatched ammunition. It was all for nothing.

...

OK guys, pick it apart. :]

[WallShadow]

Originally Posted by raketenjagdpanzer

Part II: Local history.


POSSIBLE ALTERNATE OUTCOMES:

"There's enough food...for us." - the players discover the food cache...but it's not nearly enough to share. The Germans in the region are starving, but the evacuees will be equally starved without the food that is available. Hard decisions will have to be made, for if the food is left behind the locals will now certainly loot all of it.

"There's nothing here, and there never was." (AKA "The Magical Misery Tour"). However USAREUR plans on feeding the troops on the way back home, it won't be this way. The warehouses are empty, or destroyed. Not even a wrapper from an MRE remains, only a few pitiful barrels of spoiled fuel and a box or two of mismatched ammunition. It was all for nothing.

...

OK guys, pick it apart. :]

Ever read "The Secret of Santa Vittoria"? Nothing like a little misdirection on the part of the locals to try to convince the seekers that what they see is what they get.