Kereguelen
Posts: 1829
Joined: 5/13/2004 Status: offline
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Hi, some thoughts about the Indian Army and proposals for a new Indian OOB: The main problem with India in the game seems to be that only the units that fought in Burma and/or were stationed on Ceylon are included and do mostly arrive at the time they were send to the Burma theatre or when they arrived on Ceylon. This makes it quite easy for any Japanese player to actually invade India. While this still should be a possibility, actually this would have been much harder in history because there were many more units in India which are currently not included in the game. Currently it is even nearly impossible for the Allied player to send the units that historically went to Malaya (18th British Division, 44th and 45th Indian Brigades), to Singapore because this would leave India nearly undefended even against small Japanese raids. Another problem with the Indian OOB is that the composition of the Indian Divisions changed alot during the course of the war because generally British and Indian brigades and divisions had no “organic” combat troops (battalions were not permanently attached to a certain brigade, brigades not to a certain division and so on) as most other nations. This leads to much confusion. I think the best solution would be to delete most of the Indian divisions we currently have in the game and instead make their brigades and artillery regiments available in the game (there were never enough Field Regiments available for all divisions that fought in Burma). By doing this we would have a more historic Indian OOB, give the Allied player some more choices at the start of the game and still have the possibilty of a Japanese attack on India in the game. However, it would be neccessary to alter the OOB of the Indian brigades somewhat (by deleting the 12 18pdr howitzer batteries that historically did not exist in Indian and British brigades). A more correct OOB for Indian Brigades would be: 108 Indian Rifle Squads (3 Rifle Battalions), 9 Indian Eng. Squads, 9 Engineer Squads, 18 3inch Mortars, 18 2pdr ATG, 9 Eng. Squads 133(?) Supply Squads (Engineer companies were not organic to brigades, but there were plenty of Indian engineers available). The Indian divisions that should be kept should have 2 Field Regiments (with 48 18pdr/25pdr howitzers) and either 1 LAA/AT Regiment (with 24 2pdr/6pdr, 18 20mm and 18 40mm AA guns) or 1 AT Regiment (with 48 2pdr/6pdr) included in their structure). Division with LAA/AT would have: 324 Indian Rifle Squads, 27 Indian Engineer Squads, 27 Engineer Squads, 54 3inch Mortars, 78 2pdr ATG, 18 20mm AA, 18 40mm AA and lots of Supply Squads (I have not included the Divisional HQ Defense Bn. that was included in most Indian divisions but not existing in most British divisions and because 40mm Bofors AA guns were scarce in the Far East, maybe the AA component of the division should have only 20mm AA instead of the 40mm). There were 11 Frontier Brigades (each with at least 3 battalions) guarding the NW frontier, but these should not be included because in the game there is nothing for them to guard. Indian Infantry Divisions: Completely delete 3rd, 14th, 17th, 26th and 44th Indian Divisions from the OOB. Keep 5th, 7th, 19th, 20th and 25th Indian Divisions. Now we have: 5th Indian Division (arriving 15th June 1943) with 9th, 123rd and 161st Indian Brigades, 4th and 28th Field Regiments, 56th LAA/AT Rgt incorporated. 7th Indian Division (arriving 15th October 1942) with 33rd, 89th, 114th Indian Brigades, 136th and 139th Field Regiments RA, 24th LAA/AT Regiment incorporated. 19th Indian Division (arriving 15th March 1942) with 62nd, 64th and 98th Indian Brigades, 115th and 134th Field Regiments, 69th LAA/AT Regiment (amalgameted with 33rd LAA/AT Regiment) incorporated. 20th Indian Division (arriving 15th June 1942) with 32nd, 80th, 100th Indian Brigades, 9th and 114th Field Regiments, 55th LAA/AT Regiment (amalgameted with 111th AT Regiment) incorporated. Because 51st and 53rd Indian Brigades moved to 25th Indian Division this structure seems appropiate when 25th Division is included. 25th Indian Division (arriving 15th August 1942) with 51st, 53rd, 74th Indian Brigades, 8th and 27th Field Regiments, 7th Indian AT Regiment incorporated. Indian Infantry Brigades: 7th December 1941: In Malaya: 6th, 8th, 12th, 15th, 22nd, 28th Indian Brigades as in the game. In Burma: 13th and 16th Indian Brigades as in the game. In India: 36th and 37th Brigades at Chandpur (parts of deleted 14th Indian Division) 44th Brigade at Diamond Harbour 45th Brigade at Calcutta 46th Brigade at Dacca (part of deleted 17th Indian Division) 47th, 48th, 49th Brigades at Hyderabad (parts of deleted 19th Indian Division) 99th Brigade at Jhansi (?); moved to Trincomalee in January 1942 Reinforcements: 1st Indian Brigade 1st May 1942 (from frontier duty at Rawalpindi) 4th Indian Brigade 1st April 1942 (from frontier duty in Waziristan) 23rd Indian Brigade/111th Indian Brigade 15th March 1942 (23rd was later renamed 123rd Brigade and became part of 25th Division, 109th Brigade a short-lived formation with only two battalions that fought in Arakan for some time) 26th Indian Brigade 15th July 1944 (arrived from Iraq) 55th Indian Brigade 15th September 1942 (arrived after fighting vs. the Fakir of Ipi, formed earlier) 63rd Indian Brigade 15th January 1942 (at Delhi; formed December 1941) 71st Indian Brigade 1st March 1942 (formed from existing battalions at Calcutta) 77th Indian Chindit Brigade 1st January 1943 (actually formed in June 1942, but not ready before) 111th Indian Chindit Brigade 1st July 1943 (actually formed 30th March 1943, but not ready before) 268th Indian Brigade 1st October 1942 (formed under 43rd Indian Armoured Division) 50th Indian Para Brigade 1st February 1944 (actually formed much earlier but trained a long time and was used for internal security at Delhi) Existing garrisons 7th December 1941 (not complety and not including frontier garrisons and battalions that were used to guard POW camps). Generally these locations retained garrisons during the war (even if the garrison battalions changed). 25th and 26th Battalions of the regiments were always “garrison” battalions. Bombay: 2 Battalions (26th/4th Bombay Grenadiers and 25th/10th Baluch Regiment) Karachi: 3 Battalions (15th/10th Baluch Regiment, 16th/14th Punjab Regiment, 4th/7th Gurkha Rifles) Madras: 3 Battalions (18th/5th Mahratta Lt. Infantry, 25th/9th Jat Regiment, 25th/12th Frontier Force Rifles) Dacca: 1 Battalion (25th/18th Royal Garwhal Rifles) Bangalore: 1 Battalion (9th/9th Jat Regiment) Field Regiments (Royal Artillery): This are regiments that were (at some times) included in the deleted divisions. All remained in India until 1946. On 7th December 1941 5th, 88th, 122nd 137th and 155th Field Regiments were in Malaya. 51st arrived February 1942 on Ceylon together with 16th British Brigade. 60th arrived March 1942 on Ceylon or at Karachi with the remainder of 70th British Division. 130th arrived May 1942 at Karachi (was included in deleted 14th Indian Division) 158th arrived May 1942 from frontier duty at Nowshera 160th arrived March 1942 from Quetta, may be made available 7th December 1941? 162nd formed April 1942 from existing batteries on Ceylon 18th arrived November 1942 at Karachi (with 43rd Indian Armoured Division) 9th arrived 15th January 1943 from Madagascar 123rd arrived August 1942 at Karachi (with 32nd Indian Armoured Division) 129th arrived August 1942 at Karachi (was included in deleted 14th Indian Division) 178th arrived June 1943 at Karachi, should be available from August 1943 as an Assault Field Regiment with SP-Artillery. Medium Regiments (RA): 1st arrived July 1942 at Karachi 6th at Campbellpore 7th December 1941 8th arrived Karachi May 1943 from frontier duty Anti-Tank Regiments (RA): 80th and 85th were in Malaya on 7th December 1941. 82nd arrived 1st January 1942 for 23rd Division 100th arrived March 1942 with 2nd British Division
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