BOOK REVIEW: THE SPLINTERED EMPIRES.

The Eastern Front 1917-1921

 This is the last of the four book set I bought recently on the Eastern Front during WW1. 

Just like the other books this is a deeply researched and very well written account of the final years of the war in the East , the Russian revolution and the "Pygmy Wars" that broke out after the Armistice as newly independent nations sought their place in the sun.

Following the fall of the Tsar in early 1917, the Provisional Government of Russia tried very hard to continue the war against the Central Powers but as the communist revolution swept through Russia, the army and navy basically collapsed into anarchy. Soldiers Committees sprang up to challenge the authority of officers and discipline in the military fell apart with thousands of soldiers deserting and going home. The Germans offered peace and to backup that offer launched an offensive. With virtually no opposition they advanced throughout the Baltic nations and into Ukraine. Finally, the Bolsheviks, now fully in power and more interested in the revolution than maintaining the fight against Germany, agreed punitive peace terms bringing the war in the East to a conclusion.

With the troops released, but not all as many had to be retained in the East in case the peace faltered, the Germans launched their attack in the West, the result of which is well known. With the subsequent collapse of the Central Powers and the end of the War, the various new nations in the Baltic together with a newly independent Poland all sought to strengthen their positions against Russia and each other in a whole raft of so called "Pygmy Wars". These wars are fascinating in both their variety and scale. The new nations could only field tiny armies and even German troops took part. These various wars offer a huge opportunity for wargaming and this book is worth reading just to understand those scenarios.

Overall a fascinating and very readable book which tells how eastern Europe was reshaped in the aftermath of the First World War.  Together with the previous volumes this is a highly recommended set of books on a fascinating and complex campaign.

UPDATE.

 Merry Christmas Eve Eve to all.

Just a line to thank all my readers for taking the time to read my blog this past year and I hope to retain your support in 2022. I hope you all have a great Christmas and get the model soldiers, books and other modelling or wargaming things you want from Santa. If you only get shower gel or aftershave, you did not drop enough hints and if you only get socks, you must be on the naughty list !!!!!!

The highlight of my blogging year has to be how  Ion at Archduke Piccolo blog  has taken my Imagi-Nations posts and created an amazing wargame campaign with a raft of superb battle reports. I am proud to have had even a small part in such a well received event.  I wonder if there is another campaign to be had in 2022 !!!!!

I hope 2022 is a prosperous, safe and happy year for you all.

UPDATE.

Despite the demands caused by the rapid approach of Christmas I have managed a good amount of modelling time these past couple of weeks. In fact I have completed all the upgrades I have been working on for the last couple of years. My three armies are now complete with each having a strength of 20,020 which together with an Army Group Command battalion gives me 60,302 soldiers with the colours.

I have now started construction of my new fourth army.

This photo shows the screws counted out for the first of the 24 new infantry battalions for that army. These battalions are 407 strong including the two flag bearers which can be seen to the left above. Uniform painting will commence shortly. I have also made a start on vehicle construction.

 

This photo shows a batch of 16 GS wagons and 18 light GS trailers. The vehicle bodies have been made and shafts fitted. The next steps will be fitting wheels and horse mounting blocks to the wagons before moving onto painting.

Regular readers will be aware that Ion of the Archduke Piccolo blog has been fighting a wargames campaign based on my Imagi-Nations articles. The campaign is now reaching its climax and I encourage all to read Ion's exciting battle reports. The latest is due for publication any moment now and will undoubtedly be well worth a look. Once the campaign is complete I will publish the next installment of Imagi-Nations which will give an overview of this campaign and the "historical" implications.

CONSTRUCTION OF HORSES.

The original Miniature Warfare magazine article on which my armies are based included flat horses made of card. I have used that principle for my horses but use 30 thou plastic card instead as it is considerably more durable. The idea of flat horses however in my view is perfectly acceptable. They are after all only a representation of horses in the same way that screws represent soldiers. 

As to the construction of the horses, I cut the plastic card with a modelling knife into strips using my "master" horse as a guide, then measure the length of each horse at 20mm, then cut the resultant rectangles with scissors. I then cut the horse shape freehand again with scissors. After the thousands I have made I know exactly where to cut which is around one third in and one third down give or take a bit  !!!!!!!!

The photo above shows the strip with a rectangle below and the final horse shape at the bottom. I usually cut up a whole sheet of plastic card at one time so as to have a number of horses in stock. It can be tedious to make horses for each batch of vehicles so I find it best  to have a stockpile. I will detail the painting methods I use for horses later under the  Painting Techniques heading.

BOOK REVIEW: RUSSIA'S LAST GASP.

This is the third in the series of books I recently purchased on the Eastern Front during the First World War and covers the events of 1916.

Probably the most significant military event was the Brusilov offensive. He was the only Russian general who actually studied the tactics and outcomes of the war to date and had learned much from the German offensive in 1915. Consequently he re-trained his forces and created an artillery bombardment plan.  As a result he was able to launch a highly effective assault which only came to a standstill as a result of logistical issues and the increasing presence of German reinforcements rushed from the West. However he had dealt a death blow to the already weak kuk which for the rest of the war was little more than a militia force wholly dependant on the German army.

Later in the year Romania finally decided to join the war on the side of the Allies. However they had waited a touch too long and Germany was able to transfer troops from the Brusilov front and not only stopped the Romanian offensive into Transylvania but, together with their Bulgarian allies, launched a counteroffensive which resulted in the capture of the Romanian capital Bucharest. A couple of very interesting learning points here is that the Bulgarians and  Romanians still used oxen for much of their supply service and even for some artillery units and that several Turkish divisions also took part in the invasion of Romania.

Once again the increasingly difficult food situation in Germany and Austria-Hungary is discussed together with the efforts in Germany to increase war material production. The political situation in Russia is also discussed at great length and it is noted that by the end of the year significant cracks were appearing in Russian society. The seeds of revolution had been planted and were growing at a fast pace.

Once again this really is an excellent book on the Eastern front and highly recommended .

GLUE.

My "go to" glue is UHU Hart.                                                                                                                      

  

This is an excellent glue especially made for balsa which is the basic material of all my vehicles but it is also good for sticking metal to wood provided it is used generously. I have only found one model shop that sells this glue, fortunately for me it isn't too far away but I still buy several tubes at a time. However it is readily available on the interweb. 

 The one thing it will not stick is plastic to wood. Therefore I use super glue where there is plastic which is basically only on artillery guns. That said I still roughen the plastic surfaces to ensure a good bond. I am allergic to super glue so I have to wear a mask and ensure the room is well ventilated. That means window wide open , not a big deal unless it's winter in which case I freeze !!!!! I also use an activator with the super glue, it's just so much faster. In fact if I was not allergic to it I would use superglue for everything.

 The other glues I use are plastic model glue when building cavalry but I will explain that later in an article on cavalry construction and hot melt glue which I use in the construction of GS wagons but again I will cover that in a future article on wagon construction.

UPDATE.

 With the onset of winter, as usual I find myself with a little more modelling time. I have now completed number 46 of my upgrade programme which gives 59,660 soldiers with the colours and only 618 left to finish, all of which are already at various stages of the painting process. This includes upgrade number 50, a small upgrade I recently identified which provides an additional GS wagon with drivers for each of my heavy artillery battalions.

For some time now I have been acquiring fresh stocks of materials in preparation for the building of my new 4th army. This includes paints, drawing pins (wheels), plastic card (horses), twisted wire (harness), decals  (flags), shelf support studs (field artillery), balsa wood (wagon bodies) and dowel rod (water trailers). Almost all of these items have been purchased by family members and will become my Christmas presents from them. I have reached that time of life where there really is very little else I want or need except more socks and who wants socks for Christmas !!!!

The new display unit I recently built has an extra row of shelves compared to the existing three units. This was done to enable the creation of a few extra battalions for the existing armies. Following my decision last year to provide each infantry battalion with a heavy weapons company I dismantled most of my dedication heavy weapons battalions leaving just one in each army, as army troops. I have now decided that each army should have two of these battalions.

Together with those I now have 75 battalions and regiments  to build for the new army. This is a total of just under 22,000 soldiers and about 2,400 vehicles and equipments. That includes some 490 GS wagons, 108 ammunition wagons, 275 utility trailers (field kitchens, water trailers etc), 228 guns of various types, 284 limbers, 447 light trailers (caissons, GS, signals etc), 156 other wagons (ambulances, forge wagons etc) and 390 heavy trailers (HQ, Medical, workshop etc). 

In order to keep track of what to build and to provide myself with a varied programme of different things to make, I have created a production list of 76 batches. Each batch is of a single type of vehicle, for example 30 GS wagons, 28 limbers or 24 forge wagons etc. I usually prepare all the components first then carry out assembly in stages over a number of days before painting the finished vehicles. I find that process works better for me than just making the equipment for a single battalion at a time. At the same time I also paint a battalion of soldiers which gives me plenty of variety on the workbench at all times.  Being a bit of a list freak, you will not be surprised to know that I also have detailed painting lists for the soldiers of each type of battalion too !!!!

I estimate it will take me at least five years to build the new army. No doubt during that period I will  identify any number of revisions to make to the armies, the current authorised strength of which is now a little over 82,000. There are always tweaks and changes to make which usually involve hours of fresh work. For example adding just one new soldier to each battalion would require the painting of over 280 new screw soldiers and it has taken me over two years to complete the current set of upgrades !!!! So overall this should keep me going until I reach that point in time where brain fog and overall debilitation means not getting up till lunchtime and then spending the rest of the day watching tv !!!! well actually ......