Wednesday, November 28, 2012

Africa Corps Order of Battle (DAK)

You know, Field Marshall Rommel's guys.  Just another example of the triumph of German Historiography, I recently had an opportunity to play the old SPI Boardgame on Operation Crusader.  Interesting little game, seemed to have a slight pro-Axis Bias in various ways, but no real commentary on Board Game Geek to sort it out.

BUT, while examining the counter mix, I realized that both myself and my opponent probably knew more about the Axis Forces than we did about the British/Commonwealth.  Oh sure, we "know" there was 7th Armored Division (UK) and the NZ Division, but after that it was a bit fuzzy. Now the Germans, well, you have 15th and 21st Panzer, 90th Light (Technically still Division Africa zBv at the start of the campaign?), Ariete (The Italian Armored Division), plus an assortment of other Italians.  We got bogged down on which (German) Panzer (5th or 8th) Regiment belonged to Which Panzer Division?

The Answer is, 8th Panzer Regiment belongs to 15th Panzer Division, and 5th is (nominally) subordinate to 21st.  The Four Panzer Battalions (Two per regiment) are the Major source of combat power for the Axis.  Against Ten (Much Weaker) British Tank Regiments (Battalion size units). 

Short version (More on the game later, plans to play again).  I went home and pulled a book off the top of one of my piles with the answer (above), and realize once again I have three (separate) published sets of German Order of Battle Documentation, plus at least two specialized works on the Africa Corps.  But I own NO comparable work on the British.  I tried to buy one ten years ago, what was billed as an "Order of Battle" was really a "Bathtub" game guide.  Forget the various Osprey "OB Guides", which seem to be more "Handbooks" than OB reference works.

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