Tactical Planning: The 7 Ps

You start in a parachute for this mission and have no map markers or GPSes, plus only Fireteam leaders and Element leaders have a radio.

I’m telling you ahead of time you will very likely not make the LZ marked, and should pretend you have planned a backup in case of that event happening.

I recommend you have a plan ready and communicate it with everyone during briefing.

[spoiler=OPORD]Map: Suursari
Time: 03:45, moments before first light, 1964
Weather: Light fog
Host: [user avatar=“https://assets-cloud.enjin.com/users/7849506/avatar/small.1590497467.png” name=“Seb”]7849506[/user]

OPORD

I Situation:

Piss Poor Planning Promotes Piss Poor Performance.

The island of Suursari has previously had no military presence. A few days ago, the Soviets moved troops onto the island and have installed several SCUD launchers and a radar emplacement, as well as moving hundreds of men onto the island.

A hasty operation to demolish these emplacements before they are brought online fully has been put into motion, and Task Force Nivalis has been parachuted in to disable them, however the wind picked up unexpectedly and has scattered your forces all around the AO.

Fortunately the Russians have not had time to set up solid emplacements, but that is our only advantage

Nightbird are stationed on a nearby island and can move reinserts and be assigned targets once the ground force is coherent enough to call them in.

Your have been trained on how to Sabotage SCUD launchers and Soviet Rader emplacements - do this via the interaction menu once close enough.

Only FTLs and senior have 343s and so communication will be difficult. There is no GPS or Blue Force Tracking.

Friendly Forces:

[indent][list]
[*] US Marines - Task Force Nivalis
[/list][/indent]

Assets:

[indent][list]
[] 1x UH-1H Huey Rocket Gunship ( 4 + 8 )
[
] ∞x UH-1H Huey Armed ( 4 + 8 )
[*] Rhib boats for reinsertion
[/list][/indent]

Enemy Forces:

[indent][list]
[*] Soviet Russia
[/list][/indent]

Civilians:

[indent][list]
[*] Civilian Presence in the 2 major towns - avoid.
[/list][/indent]

II Mission:

To destroy the important emplacements on Suursari

Expect patrols throughout the AO.

AO:

U-2 Photos of major objectives:

III Execution:

Commander’s intent

[indent][list]
[] Destroy Radar Station
[
] Destroy SCUDs
[] Destroy landing sites
[
] Destroy vehicle depo
[/list][/indent]

Movement Plan

[indent][list]
[] Up to units on the ground.
[
] Consider attacking objectives without full strength
[/list][/indent]

Fire Support

[indent][list]
[*] None
[/list][/indent]

Optional Tasks

[indent][list]
[*] Clear out the other emplacements marked on the map not mentioned on commander’s intent. No demolition necessary here as you are trained in sabotage
[/list][/indent]

IV Administration / Logistics:

Resupplying

[indent][list]
[] Standard supply crates available at base
[
] Fuel and Repair trucks for vehicles available at base. No ammo for helicopters. [/list][/indent]

Reinforcements:

[indent][list]
[] Reinsertions will be on the hour every hour and be adhered to strictly, no deviation is allowed. Reinsertions are the same for all, including vehicles teams.
[
] Platoon Commander has a one time reinsertion wild card at his disposal call this in through HQ.
[] At predesignated times, reinforcements will be sent out to the base in smallest transport vehicle which can hold reinforcements
[
] Upon insertion to the AO, reinforcements should stick together until regrouping with the main force in the AO[/list][/indent][/spoiler]

Well taking into consideration the starting time, lack of GPS and radios throughout the platoon the first major task is to regroup.

Depending on if with have NVG’s or not I suggest we select these three Regroup sites: R1, R2 and R3.

Each one is a large body of water and from the air it should be easier to identify, also aiming for water means we are less likely to hit trees or land on roads most likely patrolled by enemy forces. The shapes of the lakes will also allow you to identify where you have landed. It will be the priority of every member or group to mark there initial landing spot on the map to allow Plt to organise an effective regroup.

After the initial LZ Regroups I suggest everyone moves off to this Platoon Regroup marker.

Our priority targets will be the SCUD Launchers and the Radar Tower. We will move from the Plt regroup to attack the Radar Tower which will hopefully keep NightBird under the radar (pun intended).

If we have a full Alpha and Bravo we will split with Alpha going North to destroy the Scud Launchers they can stand off from the target and use NB with rockets to destroy them. Alpha will also take out Western Landing site you can hit on route to the Scuds or on way back to Plt this will be up to ASL.

Meanwhile Bravo with Plt element will move to Vehicle Depot then on to the southern landing site.

If lower than two full squads Then Alpha will take on the southern targets after radar tower while Plt and remaining move north and destroy Scuds with CAS NB.

Regroup at the end for extraction is marked.

All plans are to remain fluid as we have very little Intel on on the enemy presence.

Good plan.
A couple of points came to mind.

  • possibly remove the same R2 location. This way troops in the air only have to orientate N/S, then look for 2 large bodies of water. One less landing point means faster regroup and R2 is close enough to R1
  • Not sure if it’s 100% clear if we are intending to hit the actual LZ or going straight to R1…ect
  • Thought only: might be possible to steal "vehicles at the depo" to get up to the SCUD sight (but of course may be locked/no keys/loud …ect)
  • OPORD only mentions 343s. If we don’t have 152s in SL positions it could be dangerous to split alpha and bravo
  • Plan of attack sounds good. although the distance between SCUDs and other OBJ’s is a bit worrying
  • consider moving extraction to a more OBJ central location?
  • Do we know what side of the Island our boats/air assets are located. Match side with extract

I can’t think of anything else off the top of my head. The main point is the re-group which looks sound. After that, we can be fluid.

[quote user_id=“20330489” avatar=“https://assets-cloud.enjin.com/users/20330489/avatar/medium.1594394879.png” name=“Mattdogs”]

[list]
[] possibly remove the same R2 location. This way troops in the air only have to orientate N/S, then look for 2 large bodies of water. One less landing point means faster regroup and R2 is close enough to R1
[
] Not sure if it’s 100% clear if we are intending to hit the actual LZ or going straight to R1…ect
[/list][/quote]

Yeah good point it might be worth only having the two points of Regroup. The aim is to head towards the initial regroup markers as I very much doubt that we will be able to land at them. It is then the aim to get everyone to regroup at there nearest R1, R2, R3 site to get numbers before moving on. Thinking about it now we should set a time of 0400 before moving off from these initial regroup positions so we are not waiting around not knowing when we should be moving to the Plt Regroup.

[quote user_id=“20330489” avatar=“https://assets-cloud.enjin.com/users/20330489/avatar/medium.1594394879.png” name=“Mattdogs”]

[list]
[*] Thought only: might be possible to steal "vehicles at the depo" to get up to the SCUD sight (but of course may be locked/no keys/loud …ect)
[/list][/quote]

Can’t really plan for might be able to etc but could be worth a look however saying that it will probably be a lot safer staying hidden on route up to the scuds as roads should really be avoided whenever possible.

[quote user_id=“20330489” avatar=“https://assets-cloud.enjin.com/users/20330489/avatar/medium.1594394879.png” name=“Mattdogs”]

[list]
[] OPORD only mentions 343s. If we don’t have 152s in SL positions it could be dangerous to split alpha and bravo
[
] Plan of attack sounds good. although the distance between SCUDs and other OBJ’s is a bit worrying
[/list][/quote]

Pretty sure SL and Plt still have L/R radios. Objective distances are very far and worrying for mutual support but it mentions in the OPORD to consider attacking objectives not a full strength which to be tells me we should consider splitting up.

[quote user_id=“20330489” avatar=“https://assets-cloud.enjin.com/users/20330489/avatar/medium.1594394879.png” name=“Mattdogs”]

[list]
[] consider moving extraction to a more OBJ central location?
[
] Do we know what side of the Island our boats/air assets are located. Match side with extract
[/list][/quote]

The island I believe the choppers come from is NE which is why I placed the Extract on the East coast plus i put it on the coast because then there are also less angles of attack on the helo and they are generally safer for approaches etc.

Are we intending on actually achieving our objective or are we bugging out?

If we want to achieve our objective then establishing a beachhead for reinsert and exfil is critical to mid-to-long term fighting ability.

I agree that R2 is unnecessary.

My concern is that SCUD and Radar are so far apart I’m not convinced we can hit both of them with a single unit on foot. I would suggest considering splitting up unless we can get our hands on some vehicles

Could we possibly send a spotting element to SCUD to enable nightbird to destroy it while the rest of the platoon breaks up RADAR and vehicle depot the old fashioned way?