Pusan Perimeter: 1950

Having got most of my figure collection back in my own hands again, I had the opportunity to try something a bit different with the Battlefield Evolution rules. The Korean War.

In part this was an opportunity to field the Russian army list against the American one without it feeling apocryphal. To be fair, that was one of the first things that drew me to the period as a kid, that and (at the time, new) episodes of M*A*S*H, which did a fair job of making the Back lot of Hollywood look like the rugged terrain of Korea.

I set up a last stand scenario from the rule books selection of non-standard games. Giving the US infantry 1200 points of troops including a platoon of infantry, some supporting artillery and an M24 Chaffee tank. To aid their cause the Americans occupied trenches on the heights above an open plain dotted with a few trees and an area of rice fields.

By contrast the North Korean Peoples Army had 2000 points, comprised of two well supported but lightly armed infantry platoons and a troop of T34-85 tanks.

Unfortunately game balance spoiled this one, the Koreans were able to out shoot the Americans at distance, denuding the trenches of defenders with ease. On reflection I should have added some block houses to the defense, but these are simply too powerful in my opinion.

Hey ho. The Koreans were attacked in the flank by an American engineer platoon but it hardly slowed them down, as things got desperate (and my artillery strikes singularly failed to wipe out his machine gun sections - bloody dice!) I had to resort to sending my tank out in a last ditch effort to stem the tide.

All this served to do was get my brave little tank destroyed, and with that the Americans melted away.

Although we had stopped one flank attack early on (hence no photo's of that side of the battlefield) the other force was more than able to deal with us on its own.

Next time I think we'll stick to a regular battle.