Russian Invasion of Chechnya 1994 - Battle for Lomaz.

The smallest of paragraphs can become inspiration for a game.

COLONEL HUSEIN ISKHANOV 

The first fighting took place in the village of Lomaz Yurt in Nadterechny raion where we had some defences to protect the frontier. We managed to delay the advance of the Russians for a few days. Our men blew up 2 APCs but because of lack of ammunitions were forced to withdraw. We did not plan any large-scale operations – trying to stop the Russians columns near the border would have been pointless because we did not have enough troops. Our “army” was a joke compared to the invading army. We decided to fight in Grozny.

I was looking over Xenos Rampant to convert Russian vehicles to the stats in the book and there is a scenario which seems to fit the initial attack into Lomaz. 

Could the Russians break through the Chechen lines and drive into Grozny to end the war. The Russians can draw upon units from the Mozdok Contingent which was made up of elements of the 106th Airborne Division and the 56th Airborne Brigade.

With unlimited points the Russians need to destroy the defenders, whilst the Chechen's get a point for every turn they stay on the table. 

A great opportunity to try Xenos Rampant in a modern setting, lets see how the rules handle a bunch of armoured vehicles vs RPG touting dug in light infantry. I tried to keep to what felt like the right doctrine. The column advanced up the road and was unable to react to the defenders until they fired or moved. Leading the column was a BRDM2 followed by a main battle tank and then a couple of BTR60's.

The lead vehicle comes under fire and takes a hit, the tank comes off the road to counter the RPG and small arms fire.

The Chechen's release a blaze of fire, HMG and HE rounds send the vehicles scattering, the infantry de-bus looking to lay down some fire on the defenders, but the Russian poor morale forces the MBT and Scout Car crew to bail out as they both took multiple hits.

Not a great start, desperate to get out of the multiple units all hitting the bogged down Russians, I sent the APC's to the right their infantry were looking for cover in the tree line, but if I could get these on the flank there was a chance I could roll up the defenders.

Striped of their infantry support the Chechens ambushed them as they crossed open ground and another vehicle was KO'd. Helped by an artillery strike from their own side which missed their intended target.

Reinforcements were on the way... let's see what the Auto-Cannon's would do to infantry in a building.

Pushing further forward would be madness, the abandoned vehicles littered the battlefield, the infantry were shattered and were hunkered down in the woods and all this for 3 defenders killed.

A really good encounter, giving the commander on both sides an off table Support option was a good way of representing mortars and the like, adding in a medic to help patch up wounded figures felt ok and made the commander more like a platoon or company HQ.

Decreasing the Russian morale made them quite fragile and forced them to go to ground or backwards which felt right.

All played in under 3 hours.... these rules are definitely growing on me for modern gaming. 

So much so that I ordered some extra support weapons and Russian infantry from Eureka.....

The full document is here a very interesting read, with so many echo's of the war in Ukraine today - it does appear the Russian's have not learnt or have forgotten the lessons of 30 years ago.

COLONEL HUSEIN ISKHANOV (smallwarsjournal.com)