A first campaign in Graviteam's classic wargame     Picture it for yourself. It's late winter 1942-43, just after the German disaster at Stalingrad. You've been recalled to the Eastern Front from your cosy staff job in Berlin, and assigned to the command of a battalion-sized battlegroup in your former division, 2nd SS Panzer Grenadier Das Reich. No sooner have you arrived, than you're pitched into the deep end, as your kampfgruppe is already fully committed. Your first mission is to throw t

The 'anti-Richthofen squadron' is tested in battle!     My first show with No. 56 Squadron in France, flown in the superlative Wings over Flanders Fields, saw me wounded and hospitalised for nearly two weeks. My recovery complete, it's now 13th May 1917 ('Lucky for some', as they say) and I'm once again leading 'B' Flight. This time, there's three of us - my companions are Dixie and Prince, names it will help to remember if I need to identify witnesses to any victories I may manage (I have

Hunting the Red Baron...in a dud aeroplane!     You might be forgiven for thinking that the combination in spring 1917 of Britain's leading fighter pilot and the country's greatest fighter plane would have been the combat aviation equivalent of a marriage made in heaven. Far from it, for Captain Albert Ball DSO, MC (and later VC) was not at all impressed with the Royal Aircraft Factory's new Scouting Experimental 5. 'The S.E.5 has turned out a dud... It's a great shame, for everybody expect

New tanks on an old battlefield!     Ukrainian developer Graviteam's widely-acclaimed wargames have entered their third generation with the arrival of Mius Front, but my introduction has come only lately, and with their second-generation series - Graviteam Tactics - Operation Star (GT:OS). Why the wait? Well, I've tried a few PC wargames over the years, namely the original versions of Combat Mission and Theatre of War, and I haven't been massively impressed. Which may seem strange, given th

F-16: The Shattered Dream       The F-16 was designed from the outset as a pure Air to Air fighter, but what eventually went into production wasn’t quite the envisioned dream. The dream was partly from renowned aircraft designer Harry Hillaker at General Dynamics,who in the mid 1960s spent many of his spare hours designing the aircraft of his dreams – “a lightweight, high-performance jet that could fly circles around all other fighters”. He got to work with a group

'Superiority with the Snipe'     The title of this mission report is from the chapter on the featured aircraft in 'Sopwith - the Man and his Aircraft' by Bruce Robertson, one of a famous series of comprehensive aviation histories by British publishers Harleyford, this one dating from 1970. Quoting from that chapter:   'It is said that when No.4 (A.F.C.) Squadron after the Armistice took its Snipes to Cologne and showed their manoeuvring powers to some German airmen, they expressed first t

The Camels are coming!     Such was the title of one of the WW1 Biggles books by Captain W.E Johns  - the others being 'Biggles of 266' and 'Biggles of the Camel Squadron'. And while adapted for a younger readership - a case of beer became one of lemonade, for example - they were for me a useful, informative and entertaining introduction to the lore of World War One in the air, written by one who served in it. As the titles indicate, our hero Biggles flew a Camel. And why not, for the Camel