 | British Army Tactical Wargame (1956) | | |||
This set of rules is probably unique in the history of wargaming. The first drafts were written just after World War II and this edition was revised in the light of Britain's extensive involvement in the Korean War (1950-53). This meant that those who wrote and developed the rules did so in the light of their military combat experience. These rules were not just a work of theory.
The main author of the rules was Lt. Col. G. W. H Field who had served in the R. Leicesters who had fought as part of 29 infantry Brigade in the Korean War. However, there was input and play tests by large numbers of other, unnamed individuals, with combat experience.
During World War II Britain pioneered the use of operational research (OR) to maximise the efficiency of scare military resources. The most famous important output was perhaps the decision to largely withdraw the RAF from France (in order to preserve it for the battle over Britain) and the most well known was the use of OR by Coastal Command in the anti-U Boat operations during the Battle for the Atlantic (see Appendix 2).
The Germans were the great wargamers of World War II, but on the British side extensive effort was put into measuring and quantifying many aspects of warfare to inform the training of officers. Many of the tables in these rules reflect that effort.
These rules are different from most sets of wargaming rules. They are operational rules, in the days when battalions were considered the normal minimum size of units to use. They focussed on the time actions actually take during combat. Success comes from thinking ahead and committing your forces in the right order with correct support. The casualty rates were straight out of the OR of World War II and the Korean War. They also assume the limited use of nuclear weapons and gave soldiers the chance to explore theuse of nuclear weapons on the battlefield.
The rules look formidable, but actually, they do not take a great deal of effort to get a game going. To assist the modern player, I have made some suggestions below to help get the game going in the shortest possible time.
These rules have only come to light because of the efforts of the great wargamer, Bob Cordory (http://www.colonialwargaming.co.uk/), in searching the National Archives. He found them and released their significance. He kindly gave permission for the rules to be distributed to a wider audience via www.johncurryevents.co.uk.
The wargaming rules are probably also unique for having such a misleading title, 'Army Operational Research Group Occasional notes no. 9.'
The rules are also a work of reference about operational warfare between 1940- 1970.