MOURZOUK SCENARIO:
(11st January 1941; well, assault against Mourzouk the 11st at 12pm, so maybe from 10th to 11st, or something, to include as well the last part of the displacement)
Map:
https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bataille_ ... Koufra.jpg
The one in the 16th page could help:
https://books.google.ch/books?id=bEjWmy ... es&f=false
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Suggestion of
scenario description:
“
With the capture of Gabon, the whole of French Equatorial Africa (3 million square kilometres and 6 million inhabitants) is under the banner of Free France, which now connects the Atlantic in one piece with the British territories of East Africa and Egypt.
In December 1940, on the orders of General de Gaulle, Leclerc moves from Cameroon to Chad to bring “our” war to Libya. Lt-col Colonna d’Ornano supports Leclerc and offers him his experience as a wise Saharan (this distinguished veteran of the Great War having been trained in a méhariste camel companie).
A joint British-Free French motorized raid on the Italian fort of Mourzouk in Libya is decided. An operation of extreme audacity! Mourzouk, it’s a major Italian post in southern Libya, more than 1,000 km from Fort-Lamy (Chad)…
Colonna d’Ornano claimed and obtained the honor of being the first Free French to attack the Italian enemy, therefore joining the raiding party.”
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Suggestion for the
beginning of the briefing:
1/5:
“
The Italians at the oasis and town of Mourzouk, nicknamed “la clé de l’Occident” (the key to the West), are going to get a surprise visit that shouldn't be at all to their liking.”
(cam focus on area of Mourzouk)
2/5:
“
This is a joint British and Free French raid. We bring our experience and knowledge of this part of the region, while the British provide equipment and specialized vehicles from their “Long Range Desert Group” (LRDG), a recon and, precisely, raiding unit founded in Egypt in June 1940.”
(cam focus on our starting area with our units already deployed)
3/5:
“
These men, about seventy, all well knowing Saharan, are all volunteers. From Cairo, these New Zealanders and Scots have crossed with twenty-four vehicles and a local sheikh more than 2’000 km to rendez-vous near Kayugi with a small Free French detachment of ten soldiers leaded by Col. d’Ornano, which has brought, thanks to camels, water and fuel.”
4/5:
“
Our main objective is to neutralize the airfield for good and, incidentally, to show the potential of this type of operation.”
(cam focus on Mourzouk again)
-> And maybe a little more about the objectives…
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EVENTS:
Event 1: “
Who would have imagined it?” - after the few first turns, during the progression of the raiding party, and maybe while in a sandstorm “for the flavor”…
Just put in that quote, like this:
Ralph Bagnold, founder of the British LRDG:
“Never in our peacetime travels had we imagined that war could ever reach the enormous empty solitudes of the inner desert, walled off by sheer distance, lack of water, and impassable seas of sand dunes. Little did we dream that any of the special equipment and techniques we evolved for long-distance travel, and for navigation, would ever be put to serious use.”
---
Event 2: “
Like pirates on an ocean of sand!” - just when the raiding column found some Italian recon units (at mid-distance to the goal or something)
“Somehow similar to the British LRDG, the Italians have created a "Compagnie Auto-Avia-Sahariane" (Auto-Saharan Company) to make long range patrols in the space among the Italian forts in the Italian Sahara desert, in Italian Libya.
- ‘Seems like we’ve just bumped on an Italian patrol…
- Come on, guys, don’t let them raise the alarm, let’s teach them a lesson!”
->
With then a new objective added to destroy those 2 units (2, yes, I’ll come back to this a little later…), once they are in sight (after maybe having been spawned or moving towards our column)…
---
Event 3: “
Free French leading audacious djich!” - few turns before the end of the scenario…
“During this motorized raid, another raid, a somehow “old fashioned” one this time, has been conducted by Captain Sarazac: a camel djich (“operation”) has been led on the Italian Tedjeri’s post by its camel drivers from Tibesti.
In order to launch their attack, almost 50 men for about 70 méharis have covered 400 km particularly difficult in one week...
And if they have had far less success with their raid than we have, at least they have tried, and these raids will force the Italians to reinforce and leave troops garrisoned in the area, troops that they could otherwise use elsewhere.”
‘This could even have made another scenario… but it could be difficult to put some French cavalry, figure out it’s mounted on camel 
… well, OoB may not be exactly ready for this kind of operation right now. But it can always appear as an event and thus gives the player some immersive aspects and hints on “how it has even been sometimes”…
Maybe with a picture like this:
https://www.google.ch/search?q=m%C3%A9h ... OowVXz0ctM
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“
Colonna d’Ornano has alas been killed during this audacious motorized raid”…
But I think it’s better to not put an event mentioning this. Indeed, I think it would be better if it is “simply” written in the final texts for “Major Victory”, “Minor Victory”, etc.
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Picture of the fort:
https://www.google.ch/imgres?imgurl=htt ... 3999500658
Pictures: (some vehicles of the LRDG)
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File ... uselang=fr
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:A_Lo ... _E2298.jpg
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:T_Patrol_T10.jpg
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Some sources say that Leclerc himself could have joined this raiding party... some other doesn't mention it at all...
Well, it's better anyway to forget "a detail" instead of adding a pure mistake... So, in this case I should vote for not talking about this particular point - there is enough matter for this scenario anyway!
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The plan of attack was as follows (
after they've made their own local recon when reached the sector): the New Zealanders and the French would attack the airfield while the Scots would secure the defenders of the fort…
Main objective: destroy the hangar (and its few planes – never taking off in this scenario!) as well as the radio center (how to represent it in OoB?) as well as the nearby Fuel Depot…
Historically, the units then withdrew southwards towards the Free French post at
Zouar…
-> so, this could be represented as well
: some exit hexs, a new objective to leave the area once the main objectives are reached… After all, it’s “only” a raid, like a “hit and run tactic”, right?
So, why not?
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UNITS:
Italians:
The fort (WITHOUT the fortress and its huge canon as in OoB!) -> to represent it maybe few bunkers and a wall? Few MG-foxholes, fine as well. (See picture of the fort!)
Few regular Italian infantry as garrison
And, of course: Airfield, hangar with few planes, fuel depot, radio center, …
To surprise, intercept, perturb, etc. our moving column, I suggest a group of two (Italian)
Sahariana!
Allies:
At that period, vehicles of the
LRDG: Chevrolet WB and Willys…
So perfectly fine, as OoB contains (British)
Chevrolet WB and (American)
Willys MB M1917 (the best available in respect to the dates).
Therefore, I suggest 5 units in total:
- 2 Chevrolet WB with the British flag and the name “LRDG G Patrol” (
these are the Scots)
- 2 Chevrolet WB with the New Zealand flag and the name “LRDG T Patrol”
- 1 Willys MB M1917 with the Free French flag and the name “Colonna d’Ornano”
If anyone wants to know more about the "little-known story of a crack Kiwi World War II unit", here it is:
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/arti ... d=11838496
Digression:
Like this it represents the joint factions (flags) as well as their relative importance (the Frenchies are the fewest, the Kiwis may have been the most of all, but we can’t let to few men to “occupy” the fort, so the Scots should have 2 units at least; the “G Patrol” was composed of Scots for sure, but many of the others existing contained New Zealanders – it began with them anyway, the story of the LRDG, so I’m not sure about which letter putting before “Patrol” – it could have been elements of the “T” patrol or of the “W” patrol… so maybe no letter at all would be fine as well?… and, how to name the Free French? Not LRDG anyway, so why not a wink to this famous commander who died there?)
-> I've checked later: it's sure, it was the T (Kiwis) and G (Scots) patrols - and not the W (Kiwis) patrol ! 
So, these five unit may be nicely representative of the Allied side. Too few units won’t be much fun anyway; here it’s a scenario with each unit on map representing only few men on real…
And, by the way, at 5 versus 2, the surprise apparition of few Italian elements shouldn’t be an insolvable problem at all!
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Phew! Well, I think it's more or less all...
That's why I suggest for now to keep it simple, maybe like this: write the name of the scenario (short but understandable), its dates (to know roughly how it could be implemented in the campaign) and then the information we have. That way it would be easier for us: we gather information, we don't need to decide right now (at 100% sure 
To make the best of these events, I suggest therefore splitting our Gabon campaign in two scenarios: 
(so here much stronger because able to stop them for a while)…
):
Do not forget that it’s not required, to win this scenario, to slaughter entirely the defenders; historically, they had finally surrender!
) to fight German planes alongside the Russian “Allies”, while at the same time highlighting (for once! 
