Indirect Fire by Barrie Lovell

Following my review of the wargaming rules Free Fire Zone (Firebase Games 1996, 2nd Edition) in which I criticised the mechanisms for Indirect Fire, the author, Barrie Lovell, sent me the following explanation of his rational behind the rules. I think you will agree, like I found myself doing, that Barrie's explanation certainly helps to overcome my initial objections and makes this particular section of the rules more acceptable. My sincere thanks to Barrie for his explanation. Barrie wrote:

Just a quick point on the fire support. The original rules were designed to reflect the following:

1. Unless the requester was a trained Artillery FO then they would have little or no say in what was provided, other than giving an azimuth (bearing), range and target description. With regard to air strikes the requester had no choice - you accepted what was available (I have read of only one case where the requester was able to specify the required munitions, and in this case it was requested the day before the air strike was required).

2. The danger zones for friendly air and arty support were large, usually in the region of 500-600 meters plus (500 lb bomb fragments are on record as inflicting friendly casualties at this distance - the FAC said over the radio "I told you guys to stay down!"). However, as you know it was a regular occurrence to call it in a LOT closer. The game system was meant to allow a player to call fire in reasonably close but with the risk of inflicting friendly casualties (even I got caught out with this when using 155mm guns in support).

3. The game system was deliberately simplified to allow players to get on with the game rather than trying to operate unrealistic and complex fire requests. Seeing as how the requester did not have much say in how it worked other than calling for fire this did not seem to be a disadvantage in the game. However, wargamers being what they are I fully expected players to modify or add their own rules.

Incidentally, as part of my job in the TA, I have been trained to call in artillery fire. The procedure is simple and fast but requires good map reading, terrain analysis and compass work. The decision as to what to fire onto the target is taken at battery command post level. We simply give a target and make sure that we are not to close (our safe distance is 600 meters - particularly important when the arty decides to use MLRS rockets!).

The really difficult part of the job is adjusting the rounds on to the target. I have practiced this with smoke to indicate the hits (rather than using real artillery which is hideously expensive) and it can be hard enough in open ground. It also requires good practice at estimating distances. The problems of trying to do it in dense bush or jungle while under fire must have been tremendous...