“In wargaming, at which level is supply more important, or has the greatest impact, the tactical or strategic?” The short answer is: strategic. In wargaming, supply impacts at all levels of combat, however, it has its greatest effect at the strategic level. That is not to say that the effects of supply are not involved or inherent at the tactical level. At the tactical level of wargaming, the time frame of most scenarios is too short for supply to affect the outcome.
Clausewitz posed the question, “Does war govern the type of supply system, or does the supply system govern war?” His answer: first the supply system will govern war and how it is waged, and subsequently war will govern supply and how it is handled. In war, a force’s initial supply system will dictate how the opening of that war will be conducted. As a war matures, the needs of combat and support will dictate the development of the supply system, and how it is implemented to best support the armed forces. In wargames, supply is manifested in many ways, being dictated by the scale and scope of the game, as well as by the desires and goals of the designer. However, the need or practicality of a supply system and the desired level of realism will dictate whether a supply mechanism is to be included and how it is implemented.
The degree of abstraction, as applied to the different levels of wargaming, should be the greatest in a tactical level game. This is because of the small unit and time scales of a tactical game. At a squad or man-to-man level, a scenario will last from minutes to perhaps hours of scale time, a time period too short for the concerns of supply to have any significant effect on the outcome of the action. This does not mean that the effects of supply should be ignored. Supply mechanisms can be quite detailed, especially at the tactical level. However, the amount of energy that would be required to exercise tactical supply mechanics is not worth the time lost when playing at this level. The effect of supply in a wargame, advantages and disadvantages, is addressed quite well in Avalon Hill’s Squad Leader*, with the ‘breakdown number’. This number not only represents the reliability of the equipment in question, but also the availability of ammunition in adequate quantities, where applicable. Availability of specific ammunition types is represented by such factors as the “HEAT #” (High Explosive, Anti-Tank ammunition). When supply appears on a game map at the tactical level it is usually the object or subject of a scenario: i.e., a cluster of buildings or a specified hex acting as a supply dump to be protected or captured; or a truck convoy moving across the game map. The presence or lack of supplies cannot influence the effectiveness of combat troops within this time frame.
Expanding the tactical level to platoon and company size units, a scenario will rarely last more than a game day or two, again the time scale being appropriate for the unit scale. Combat units usually carry enough supplies to last several days, again enough not to have any direct effect on combat effectiveness within the time frame of the action. When supply might have an effect, it can be worked-in abstractly, such as adjusting the breakdown numbers, or reducing a unit’s combat effectiveness a level or two through morale and other suitable mechanisms. On a practical note, who wants to worry about moving and unloading supply vehicles when you can smell the enemy’s breath. Also, at a scale this small, the combat supply source will rarely be close enough to the action to appear on the map.
At the operational level, battalion, brigade, regimental, and perhaps divisional scale, the same supply concerns come into play. Who wants to move supply columns when trying to flank the Panzer Lehr division? Yet, it is at this level that supply begins to have a greater, more direct effect on combat. At this scale, a game generally runs to game weeks or longer. Only LRRP’s and ranger type units have the wherewithal to last that long with limited or no re-supply.
The most common method for establishing supply in a game is the Line Of Communication (LOC). A Line Of Communication is the path or route that links an armed force with its base of operations. This link can be of any length, and number of actual routes or methods of supply (road, track, sea, air, etc.). This method usually requires a unit to trace a route of any length between itself and its supply source. These supply sources are generally map edges, HQs, or supply dumps (hexes or counters). The problem with such a system is its lack of realism, in the sense that in a simulation one is looking for real-world problems with their inherent causes and effects. Imagine regimental supply following a route of a hundred scale miles, when the straight line distance is only 5 or 10 miles. Designers have implemented limited LOC lengths to add a greater sense of realism: the longer the supply line, the fewer supplies that can get through and therefore lower combat effectiveness.
A long-standing, as well as highly abstracted, hindrance to supply is the Zone Of Control (ZOC). A ZOC traditionally extends to the six hexes immediately adjacent to the hex occupied by the unit exerting it. In most occurrences ZOCs allow supply into or out of a ZOC controlled hex, but not through the hex. Justification for this feature is established in the definition of ZOC: a ZOC represents influence of a unit (direct and indirect), as well as those units that patrol outside that (parent) unit’s main perimeter (as defined by the hex boundary). These influences can be a combination of scouts, recon patrols, skirmishers, etc. It also represents what Clausewitz defined as “friction.” A facet of friction is the effect caused by two forces in aggressive contact, which may slow down and reduce the size those forces. A force is slowed because it needs to be deployed in a more dispersed manner when in contact to achieve greater preparedness for imminent combat, and therefore much slower to move. Attrition, another aspect of friction, is the result of the normal loss of troops through minor combat between two aggressive forces. A good example of friction at the strategic level, which can cause unit loss, is the Attrition Combat Option, as used in Avalon Hill’s Third Reich*. An example of ZOC friction slowing down units is the additional movement point cost usually imposed on a unit when it moves into, out of, or through a ZOC.
At the highest level, strategic supply has the most impact on play. At this level a nation’s ability to wage war, and therefore attempt to gain its political objectives, is dependent upon its ability to manufacture, acquire, and deliver supplies to its combat units. In Sun Tzu’s The Art of War he begins Book II of that work be enumerating the costs of fielding an army. He goes on to warn that extended warfare will bankrupt the resources of the state. He espouses that maintaining an army from a distance will impoverish the people, yet, a standing army in close proximity will inflate prices and deprive the people of their substance. Furthermore, a protracted war will raise the government’s war expenses to half of its revenues.
Third Reich handles the national costs of war through its Basic Resource Points (BRP’s) system of expenditures. BRP’s represent a nation’s industrial base, as well as its ability to put men into the field. To add to the strategic importance of BRPs, a nation has a BRP Growth Rate. This is a percentage rate applied to a nation’s remaining BRP’s at the end of a game year, and then added to that nation’s base BRP level. The BRP Growth Rate is the nation’s ability/potential for its industrial base to grow. The result of the BRP rate on the remaining BRPs is added to the affected nation’s BRP base, which established that nation’s new BRP base. This allows a nation to plan ahead permitting it to expand its ability to wage war. BRP’s are an abstraction, in that the kinds of supply are not specified, only generally applied to the needs at hand. Yet, BRP’s still need to be applied to achieve the national goals, and to be transported like physical materials when appropriate.
As we have seen, all levels of wargaming are influenced by supply. However, as the scale increases to larger and larger unit types, the actual effects of supply increases. The detrimental effects of limited supply on a small unit is not likely to affect that unit’s upper echelons. It could, but “the want of a nail” analogy is not likely to cause a corps to lose cohesion if one squad is out of ammo. If a division falls in that category (out of ammo) then the corps is in trouble.
An aspect of supply that is seldom addressed is its effect/influence on morale. Think of the effect on a soldier’s mental state if he hasn’t received mail in several weeks (you former servicemen know what I mean). Or, when he knows he has only a day’s rations, and the next scheduled supply drop is three days away, if it comes at all (note: the Ardennes, December, 1944). Imagine how you would feel if in the middle of an intense firefight you only had a few clips of ammo left, and you were cut off from your supply source.
It is at the tactical level where morale has its greatest impact on the outcome of a battle. It is only at this level where a game can represent how a single man, or a group of men can affect the way a battle flows. As the scale of a game increases the effects needed to be abstracted more and more as each higher level is reached. Finally, the effects of low morale intertwine with those of supply. The manner in which morale is handled, is again, up to the designer. A factor to be considered is playability. The age old concern about the creation and use of wargames is the spiraling balancing act between realism and playability. The greater the realism, the lower the playability. Ergo, the higher the level of playability the less realism apparent in the game. Sun Tzu warned about an army moving with a full train, as being unable to act in a timely manner, and a unit that moves too fast will lose its baggage and therefore be ineffective in combat. The same goes with wargaming and the balance between realism and playability. Such is the dilemma between simulations and re-creations. In a simulation one has the greatest chance to create a game that is playable and somewhat realistic. In a re-creation a designer needs to include all the factors that were present at the original event. This can be a tedious and overwhelming design effort, and if managed, a tedious and overwhelming gaming effort. A simulation is used to create a “feel” of the original event or type of event. By its very definition a simulation is not an attempt to represent a reality, but to represent aspects of a reality. In gaming, such as chess, we are able to use pieces that represent different types of units that might see combat. We then have them play out their assigned roles over a playing area that is as highly abstracted as can be achieved without removing the playing field entirely.
The goal of wargame designers, from the first wargames using stones on wooden or clay playing areas to the present use of computers, has been to provide players, professional and casual, the opportunity to experience and learn about war without the inherent risks. Often (usually) realism is sacrificed in order to represent the problems to be overcome and allow the player to experiment with a minimum of hassle.
Professional wargaming has been known for millennia. The ancient game of GO was and is a game requiring a sound grasp of strategy. However, wargaming in the modern sense did not appear until the late 17th and early 18th centuries. In the late 18th century, in 1797 Georg Venturini, a military author and scholar, created a wargame entitled “Rules for a New Wargame for the Use of Military Schools.” It received mixed responses from the German high command. The game stood out in that the playing area represented an actual piece of terrain with historical interest, a stretch of the French – Belgian border. Prior to this the wargame boards were highly abstracted. Elements that further elevated the game over its predecessors were the pieces and the complete, albeit complex, rules. The pieces represented the usual infantry, cavalry and artillery, but also included pieces that represented bridges, wagon convoys, supply magazines and even field bakeries. For the first time in wargaming history logistics were included and considered when mounting a battle or campaign. Venturini was able to balance the needs of combat and logistics into a system designed to aid in the learning of operational stratagem. The game area covered 3,600 square miles of terrain, roughly 60 x 60 miles.
In the early part of the next century Baron von Reisswitz, a war counselor to the Prussian courts developed a wargame that was easier to learn, and easier to use. Von Reisswitz’ game was comprised of a sand table that could be molded to represent different actual or hypothetical areas. However, a further element that bespoke of its usefulness was the combat pieces. The pieces were made of wood rectangles, that when appropriately placed, accurately represented a unit’s proper frontage ,when in column or in line; as well as being marked with the common symbols of the day for the unit types they represented. He later discarded the sand table for tiles which depicted various types of terrain that could be pieced together to form almost any area of potential combat. Also, the area that could be arranged with the terrain tiles only covered 4 square scale miles. Later, von Reisswitz’ son, a Prussian Army officer, replaced his father’s tiles with 1:8000 scale maps. Furthermore, the Baron’s rules only covered movement of troops, and let the combatants and a judge determine the outcome of battles. His son codified the results of real combat and created tables to be referred to to determine combat results. The younger Reisswitz further expanded the rules to cover the operations of divisions and corps from the brigade and regimental scale of the original game. Comparing the games represented here, one can see that men, whose business it was to conduct war, concerned themselves with those things appropriate to that which they were inclined to study: namely, how to conduct a war and how to conduct it as effectively and efficiently as possible. In Venturini’s game, at an operational level, supply was considered critical to the conducting of warfare. Where von Reisswitz, and later his son, created and developed a game at the tactical level which did not concern itself with the mundane aspects of supply.
—–History of Supply—–
Prior to the industrial age, armies in the field depended on the ability of their current locale to supply the bulk of their needs, specifically: food and shelter. To some extent, ancient armies could find even clothing, arms, and recruits when away from their native land. As time marched on, and nations matured, the reliance on the home country for men and arms increased. The ever expanding sizes of field armies increased the amount of provisions needed to supply these armies.
With the maturation of nations came the increased needs of those nations. These can be put in a general list comprised of land, resources (natural and man-made), manpower, freedom, and wealth. To attain these, nations would wage war against their neighbors, and colonize. The logistics of supplying larger armies proved cumbersome and fragile, when all supply was provided directly from the home country. As these supply lines (LOCs) lengthened, troops were left behind at strategic locations to guard the LOCs. As a result, the size of an army and its fighting ability diminished as it moved further away from its base of supply. The situation further exacerbated by the usual disease and desertion that accompanied armed forces in the field. (Note: Napoleon’s invasion of Russia in 1812.) Furthermore, the numbers of men, horses, and wagons that were needed increased with the length of the LOCs, which further reduced the ranks, as well as the manpower base used to replenish those ranks. To minimize this loss in resources, armies would forage or requisition the supplies they needed from the surrounding cities, towns, and countryside. The only supplies brought from the home country were arms, munitions, replacements, and those things that were necessary to maintain an army in the field, which could not be obtained in the field. The reduction of supply transit allowed for faster movement of troops to the front and beyond. By limiting the types of materials to be brought to the front, an army is not slowed down, and can actually maintain much of the strength of its battle formations.
Twenty-five centuries ago Sun Tzu stated, “A skillful general does not raise a second levy, neither are his supply wagons loaded more than twice.” Once in war he will not wait for reinforcements, nor turn back for more supplies, he crosses the border without delay. The skillful general will plan before the need arises. Knowledge of the enemy and the terrain to be traversed and fought upon will provide a general with the information needed to fight and win a war in the shortest time possible. It has been rumored that Napoleon based his warfare techniques on Sun Tzu’s book. As has been seen, many of the basics of supply and warfare used by Napoleon compare strikingly with those described by Sun Tzu. A few of these are: to bring war materials with you, but forage on the enemy; “One cartload of the enemy’s provisions is equivalent to twenty of one’s own…”
The techniques and theories of supply remained after the Napoleonic wars, for the most part, unchanged until well into this century. There are, of course, exceptions to every rule. The exceptions to this are found in the most industrialized nations of the world. In the American Civil War, the Federal industrial and manpower bases were almost limitless in their abilities to put replacements into the field, and subsequently outfit and supply them. It was the North’s ability to provide quantity that eventually wore down and subsequently defeated the quality of the Confederacy. That, however, is a subject for another time. (Note: Not unlike the U.S.S.R. and Germany in 1942/43, and the Allies and Germany in 1943/44.)
At the height of its colonial era, Great Britain used its industrial might and mastery of the seas to expand and control its vast empire. In contrast to the American Civil War, the British lacked the quantity produced by the North, but in many ways excelled over the North in its quality of material, and over the South’s qualities of leadership and combativeness. Furthermore, the overall quality of British forces and its advanced industrial standing allowed Britain to subdue nations that far surpassed her in manpower. Supporting all of this was Britain’s seapower, and its ability to extend this power to supply and support its forces at the four corners of the globe. To Britain’s credit, was the ability of her forces to adapt to their varied and widely dispersed locales, and the use of indigenous materials and manpower. Much, if not most, of this manpower went as labor. Therefore, supporting the practice of limiting the need and flow of supplies to the bare necessity, and thus freeing Britain’s manpower base and transport system to further exploit and expand the empire. As with the American Civil War, the hows and whys of Britain’s colonial demise are for another time.
In World War One (WW I) most forces were either on their own home soil, or so near to it that their ability to supply troops was not an issue. The obvious exceptions are the U.S. troops in Europe, and the troops of belligerents conflicting in their colonies. Excluding those exceptions, the effects of supply were limited to the operational level of combat. Supply was able to reach the front lines, where the actual supply of front line units was the major task at hand for the corps’ and divisions. Though strategic supply was not the great issue of WW I, several developments during the war would affect future wars, primarily World War Two (WW II), with Korea and Vietnam at the operational level. One of these developments was Germany’s use of U-Boats, which harried Allied shipping. Though u-boats had no severe or long term effects in WW I, the development of the theories and eventual policies for their use by Germany in WW II would almost bring Britain to her knees. The next development was the use of aircraft in combat. Tactically speaking, aircraft had a negligible effect on the outcome on WW I. Air reconnaissance however proved valuable to both sides, with observations being used operationally to aid in making numerous command decisions. The greatest effect of air strategically was the use by Germany of balloons to bomb cities in Britain, notably London. The effects of these bombings were minimal, tactically, but they drew needed forces from the front to protect against these attacks. The strategic applications of aircraft, as used in WW II, were to attack an enemy’s industrial base, and to interdict its LOCs. Germany was never able to fully take advantage of strategic bombing, but did usher in tactical and strategic interdiction techniques as major parts of her military operations, (Note: Blitzkrieg in Poland in 1939 and France in 1940, and the U.S.S.R. in 1941), techniques the U.S.S.R. would apply, and the U.S. would fine tune, to such an extent that they took on new forms.
The greatest turning point in the theory and method of supply in the field, since Napoleon, was the gearing up of the U.S. industrial base in 1941 and 1942. In the years leading to WW II most of the Allied nations were too late to see what was needed to prepare to defend themselves from Nazi Germany’s onslaught. This applied as well to the U.S. The U.S. did begin making preparations in the late 1930s, but they were too little in many respects. There were many who believed that the war in Europe was none of our affair, and hampered the efforts of the military and the White House to start full-scale preparations for war, as a result, only minimal preparations were underway. Fortunately, the White House and many in the military were able to prepare for the coming involvement of the U.S. in the war in Europe. As it turned out, the war in Europe became a world war, and thus stretched the resources of the entire world toward combat, and the supply and support involved therein.
To one degree or another all nations were hard pressed to adequately supply their forces. Of all the nations involved, only the U.S. had the ability to provide its own resources and industry to completely supply its own forces. The Soviet Union in one of the greatest feats of modern times was able to physically move its industrial base from Russia and the Ukraine to East of the Ural mountains, and thus beyond the reach of Germany’s forces. The newly placed industrial base was eventually able to turn out vast quantities of war materiel to outfit the Soviet forces. However, even with this great accomplishment, the Soviet Union still needed material from the U.S. to adequately supply her forces.
It was the tremendous ability of the U.S. industrial base to completely retool and rethink itself, and eventually supply every allied nation, to some extent, with the materials to conduct war. There were many factors that contributed to this great feat of modern industrial capability. One was, of course, the physical separation of the U.S. from the European and Asian continents, as well as its vast supply of natural resources. Safe from military attacks, U.S. industry was able to proceed almost without incident in its conduct of wartime manufacture. At the national level, a strategy was developed that combined military and national needs, and subsequently attempt to meet them.
What finally evolved was a system of logistics that not only considered the materials needed to fight a world war, but how to get those materials where they were needed most. The organization of all of these factors led to such an output of material in such a limited time, that it is likely never to be matched again. Around the country factories were manufacturing everything from buttons and shoelaces to rifles to aircraft carriers. Manufacturing techniques were developed that allowed mass production on a scale never seen before or since.
The logistic considerations of WW II by the U.S. didn’t end when material came off of the assembly line. It continued with the allocation of these materials to numerous depots and distribution centers and on to the wharves where cargo ships waited to transport these materials overseas. Once at sea, these ships had to avoid German and Japanese submarines, as well as the natural hazards of the open ocean. Upon reaching their overseas destinations, these materials were transported by road, rail and air to more depots and distribution centers, where they would be further allocated to where they were needed the most (hopefully). The system followed a loop where the needs of the troops were evaluated, and these needs collated and further considered and then transmitted to the appropriate manufacturing and transporting organizations, where the whole process of manufacture, supply, and evaluation would begin again.
In the Korean conflict the same methods of supply to the front, as developed in WW II, were used, but now with the added dimension of helicopters. Being a localized conflict, there was no need to mobilize on a national scale, as was done in WW II. The economy did not gear up as thoroughly, in fact U.S. industry was still producing countless luxury items, such as refrigerators, automobiles and televisions. Furthermore, all supply was transported from the U.S. without risk of interception, thus allowing a greater allocation of available forces to combat.
Less than ten years after the Korean war, the U.S. involvement in Vietnam began its steep escalation in forces and efforts. On the U.S. side, the U.S. industrial and logistical might once again came through. For the first time in U.S. military history, troops could get ice cold Cokes and ice cream on the front lines. Since the perimeter of every compound, base, village and city constituted the front lines, this meant just about everyone. With there being no true front, the nature of LOCs changed. For the first time LOCs existed in the air. True, airpower was used to supply troops who were surrounded from WW II to the present, but now airborne LOCs were part of the normal operational procedures. There were still truck convoys, but now units in the field could be supplied in minutes instead of hours or days.
The war in Vietnam, from the re-entrance of the French in 1946 to the evacuation of Saigon in 1975, in almost thirty years never changed (change being a relative term). The nature and methods of the invaders, France, the U.S. and the U.N. changed, but the nature of the war didn’t. It was a peasant war, a people’s war. There were never recognizable front lines, only perimeters. By its nature, the issues of supply for the North Vietnamese Army (NVA) and guerilla Viet Cong (VC) were different than those of the French and U.S. forces. At its simplest, the supply for the VC consisted of caches of food locally supplied and arms and ammunition brought in from North Vietnam along the Ho Chi Minh Trail, or captured from the occupying forces (Japanese, French, U.S. and U.N.).
Consider this: an American 800 man battalion has only 200 combat troops; all the rest are in a support role. If you were to look at the composition of an equivalent VC unit, almost all would be combat troops. Supply for the NVA and VC was supplied in several primary ways. The first was shear manpower, where tens of thousands of people would carry rice and other supplies hundreds of kilometers on their backs along the Ho Chi Minh Trail from North Vietnam to numerous turn off points into South Vietnam from Cambodia and Laos. Eventually the Trail would become such a major route of transport it became capable of carrying truck convoys. To counter U.S. interdiction of the Trail, tens of thousands of troops would be placed at strategic points with anti-aircraft weapons, as well as personnel to repair the road.
Both the U.S. and the Vietnamese used a large portion of their total number troops and personnel to actually support their combat troops. However, where the U.S. relied on their being able to bring their material thousands of miles from the U.S. by air and ship, the North Vietnamese only had hundreds to consider. Furthermore, the U.S. was somewhat limited in the manpower they were able to bring to bear in this support role because of problems on the home front. The NVA and VC however had all they needed locally, almost guaranteeing a limitless supply of support personnel. Eventually the U.S was able, through its interdiction methods, to greatly curtail the supplies reaching enemy troops in South Vietnam, and almost bring the war to a satisfactory conclusion. The deciding factor in the war of supply was the U.S.’s vast industrial power. The deciding factor in the war of combat was political. Where we were able to put a veritable stranglehold on the VC’s supply, we were unable to defeat their troops because our hands were tied politically. Again, this is material for another time.
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* Copyrighted names
Sun Tzu, _The Art of War_. Dell Publishing, New York, N.Y., 1983. Edited by James Clavell.
Von Clausewitz, Carl, _On War_. Princeton University Press, Princeton, N.J.,1976. Edited and translated by Michael Howard and Peter Paret.
Perla, Peter, _The Art of Wargaming_. U.S. Naval Institute, Annapolis, MD. 1990.