perfidy

Operational Art of War III
Scenario "Taiwan 2015"

People's Republic of China: Programmed Opponent (PO)
Taiwan: Yours truly

This scenario is a hypothetical sketch of an invasion of Taiwan by the PRC. Discussion below the fold.

The area of operations is the northern quarter or so of Taiwan. The north-central area is dominated by Taipei and environs; to the west, there is dense urban terrain around the airport. Much of the map outside the cities is open/cropland that favors fairly easy mobility.

The PRC starts out aggressive, but is not consistently so. Turn 1 finds large airborne attacks that seize the airport and much of the surrounding city; the harbor; and most of Taipei proper. Subsequent turns see further airborne drops, as well as marine infantry flowing into the harbor. By about Turn 4, Taipei was in commie hands, their grip on the western areas was strong, and the marines were poised to blast south between them.

The good news for the Taiwanese player is that victory is tied to Taipei. The city center is worth 90 vp alone; counting up the broader urban sprawl surrounding it, it’s in the neighborhood of 200 vp. This is good, because the mission is pretty cut and dried: hold Taipei, win.

In order to do that, a couple of things needed to happen. The strong marine forces lollygagging around the harbor could not be allowed to flow into the city; I had a feeling that once in there they’d never be dug out. As it was, the light units dug into the city were trouble enough. The enemy marines had to be either destroyed, fixed in place, or otherwise prevented from linking with its forces in Taipei to the E or the force in the W. Such a link would establish a solid line of invaders across a fairly narrow frontage, stretching across nearly half the island. The Taiwanese player does not have enough combat power fielded to destroy them; fixing them might be feasible with a strong force, but most of my heavy units were trying to wrest the airport or the capital from the bad guys.

So it looks grim in the opening turns- strong PRC units appear everywhere you don’t want them, and do a lot of damage. Friendly forces are dispersed and, early on, inadequate to do much beyond meeting engagements. But, as with NATO/Pact scenarios, the invader’s reinforcements peter out as the defender’s increase. Although parity is never reached, Taiwan is able to field some robust armored and mech units, as well as several attack helo units that are very effective against PRC artillery.

What ended up happening was that I had basically 3 forces. The west had armor and mech units leavened with some reserve leg battalions that, in time, were enough to destroy most of the PRC airborne and push back the rest until the enemy line thickened up with reinforcing marine units. In the east, everything I had went toward retaking Taipei, an ugly fight. The only way to keep attrition to a minimum in the destroyed, dense rubble of the city is the application of overwhelming, concentrated firepower. There are no political consequences of reducing the city to ash, or for making the rubble bounce, so go for it. The defenders don’t retreat readily, so it’s fairly easy to maneuver around and isolate them, but then it’s time consuming to eradicate them. The center, though, was my biggest concern.

Even though the game would be won by whoever held Taipei at the end, the PRC marines in the center were the key element in the fight. After committing everything I felt was needed to recapture the capital, there was very little left to drive between the city and those enemy marines. For most of the game, I had a thin line of leg infantry and a couple small mech formations as a speed bump for them, and that was it. At any moment, the PRC marines could have burst out of the harbor area and swung east to relieve the capital, or west to maneuver across the open terrain and envelope my force there. The PO chose neither. It made a few thrusts that pushed the line back pretty easily, but it never really went for it. Once all the PRC’s units were committed to Taiwan, it just sort of let them hang around. An aggressive human opponent would’ve eaten my lunch, I’m sure.

This scenario is really the PRC’s to lose; with Taipei and the airport the game is all but won. The rest of the game should be spent holding them, and parrying efforts to dislodge them. There is plenty of space and favorable terrain for bold maneuver, but in this scenario it’s not strictly necessary for the win. I’d like to try this fight again, but as the Chicoms, and see what kind of damage I can do with those marines.