It has almost been a year since I played the German commander in day one of an Operation Seelöwe game which I reported on here: The Battle of Folkestone July 1940. The end of this game saw the Germans establishing a salient around Hythe and Folkestone after suffering heavy casualties.

After a number of strategic moves conducted by email, we picked up the action a few days ago, moving the game on to day three. The situation at the end of day 2 looked pretty bleak for us Germans. The Royal Navy had made a mess of our attempts to reinforce and resupply by sea and despite the Luftwaffe’s best efforts to establish air superiority we did not have control of the skies. Low on ammunition and thin on the ground the temptation was to hold on to what we had and await reinforcements. The British, however, would be able to reinforce far more quickly than we could so I decided that my only option was to try to expand the salient and position my troops to eventually take Dover and its vital docks.

I knew I did not have the strength to take Dover so I gave orders for my best units to move east from Folkestone to cut the road and rail links into the town in the hope that I could isolate it. Having beaten off a counter attack on Hawkinge airfield and receiving intelligence that the enemy had ‘shot their bolt’ in that sector, I also decided to expand the salient to the north so as to be in a better position to protect that important airfield. I would leave just enough troops to hold the western edge of the salient, especially Lyminge airfield and the port of Hythe. I suspected we would have to face a British counter-attack and so I ordered my commanders to take up defensive positions as soon as they ran into any serious resistance.

The British did indeed counterattack and did so in more strength that I had feared. Our attempt to expand the salient turned into a defence of our vital points: the airfields of Hawkinge and Lyminge, and the ports of Hythe and Folkestone. We beat off an attack on Hawkinge with relative ease thanks to the quality of our troops aided by an effective Stuka bombing run.

In the west the British attacked both Lyminge airfield and the approach to Hythe in divisional strength. I judged that with three battalions in good defensive positions and a regiment of Fallschirmjäger in reserve I had just enough men to hold without diverting any troops from the east. It was touch and go. We managed to hang on by the skin of our teeth but it took all the remaining ammunition of our supporting artillery and our last remaining bombing runs to do it.

On the approach to Hythe the 2nd Battalion, 21st Infantry was reduced to only one platoon but they passed all morale tests and hung on in the village of Adlington while the Fallschirmjäger flanked the enemy that bypassed them. The RAF intervened but fortunately their air sorties were far less effective than ours. A few reinforcements arrived by sea at Hythe. This was just enough to ensure we could hold the western flank.

We had barely time to congratulate ourselves for the successful defence of Hawkinge airfield when the British launched a major attack from the north aiming for Folkestone town. We had very few troops in this sector, our artillery was low on ammunition and we had no air sorties left. Therefore we had to redirect troops from the east, including our only Panzer battalion to deal with this attack. The fighting was fierce and we inflicted heavy losses on the enemy but at a terrible cost including the complete destruction of our armoured reserve.

At this point the British launched an attack from Dover in overwhelming strength — both armour and infantry. Our eastern flank was only thinly held, we were out of artillery ammunition, had no tanks left and no more air support. It had been very hard fought and our heavily outnumbered troops had acquitted themselves incredibly well. With the enemy in a position to dominate Folkestone Docks there was no longer any hope of significant reinforcements and therefore Operation Seelöwe had failed.

Although we lost it was a great game and a very hard fought one. As in the previous game we used 6mm miniatures with Spearhead rules. The rules worked very well for an operational game of this magnitude. They were easy to pick up by novices with the aid of some judicious umpiring.

My historical wargames interests are set firmly in the time before firearms become effective.

Some time ago I dabbled for a bit with Cold War micro-armour but the last WWII game I fought was decades ago.

It was on my childhood bedroom floor with unpainted Airfix HO 8th Army and Africa Korps — the original 1960s sets.

Shortly after watching the film Dunkirk, I was inspired to break the mould by an invitation to play the German commander in a 'what if' Operation Seelöwe game. The scenario imagined a German landing on the beaches of southeastern England on 14 July 1940. The British would have been licking their wounds after Dunkirk while the Germans would have been feeling the wind behind their sails.

I was given a rough map with even rougher intelligence. From this I had to select 4 beach squares, on each of which I could land an infantry regiment of 3 battalions, which would arrive in three waves. I also had two parachute regiments and could select three adjacent squares for each of the regiment’s battalions to land. Following on from my decisions and those of the British commander, a tactical game would be played to see what happened next.

I decided to concentrate my attack on Folkestone with a diversionary attack on Deal. The blue circles A-D were the beaches I selected and the maroon circles 1-6 were the parachute landings. Hythe and Deal had small harbours which would allow me to land infantry reinforcements while Folkestone and Dover had proper ports where I could land heavier troops. If I captured the airfields of Hawkinge (maroon circle 4) or Lyminge (maroon circle 1) then I had the possibility of bringing in further reinforcements by air.

Dover had a better port than Folkestone and would allow me to bring in more reinforcements. I decided, however, not to attack there as it seemed like too hard a nut to crack. I felt that if I took Folkestone, Hythe and the two airfields then I could concentrate my forces in a relatively tight area with good opportunities for landing follow-on troops and supplies.

I allocated the vast majority of my air resources to achieve air superiority, leaving some air assets to provide cover for my landing craft and ships. I also ordered a naval bombardment of the beaches north of Dover to hopefully divert British attention there.

The tactical tabletop game which followed was played out in 1:300 scale on a 16 x 6 foot table covering the area from RAF Lyminge in the west to the beaches northeast of Folkestone. The rules we used were Spearhead. I had no experience of these or any other WWII rules before. I found they worked rather well. They are relatively simple and do not get bogged down into fine detail. The mechanisms are easy to remember and give enough tactical nuance to make close actions interesting while keeping the game at the grand tactical level.

The para-drops drifted a bit and did not land exactly where I had wished. Those aiming for RAF Lyminge had a bit of a hike to get to their target and by the time they reached the airfield, British infantry reinforcements were already arriving form the west.

It was easier at RAF Hawkinge and after hard fighting my paratroopers were able to overcome the defenders to take the airfield. As soon as they had they done this, the1st London Rifles arrived from the north to launch a counter-attack. After fierce fighting both sides were so worn down that the survivors dispersed leaving Hawkinge airfield unoccupied.

One of the parachute battalions from the regiment assaulting Hawkinge was tasked with cutting the rail junction above Folkestone (maroon circle 6) and then support the infantry attack on Folkestone. It took the attached engineers an inordinate amount of time to blow the rail lines (thanks to low die rolls) but when they finally did, their support of the attack on Folkestone proved invaluable.

The initial landings on the beaches met little initial resistance but as soon as the German infantry approached Hythe and Folkestone they ran into a determined defence which more or less wiped out the first wave of attackers in house to house fighting.

It was hard going and it took supporting attacks from the paratroopers before they finally managed to clear the defenders from the built up areas. An ad-hoc battalion of British sharpshooters from the nearby School of Small Arms were particularly annoying.

My troops managed to take Hythe in tact but just as Folkestone was about to fall into my hands the defending stevedores blew up the port facilities rendering it useless for landing much needed reinforcements.

I re-occupied Hawkinge airfield with infantry from the third wave but the RAF Regiment defending Lyminge grimly held on to the last man, inflicting heavy casualties on the paratroopers who finally captured it.

As daylight began to fade I started to set up defensive perimeters, anticipating a fierce counter-attack, especially from the direction of Dover. When I moved troops towards the village of West Hougham to take up a position dominating the road to Dover they came under fire from the Home Guard. They had been reinforced by British regulars who had fled Folkestone along with a heavy machine gun.

Despite repeated artillery bombardments the defenders of West Hougham kept up a withering fire on my men, taking out a 50mm anti-tank gun and several platoons of infantry. They held up my advance for 4 hours and it took paratroopers reinforced by 2 tanks to finally clear the village so I could establish my defensive perimeter.

The umpire called the game as night fell on 14 July 1940. I held two salients around Folkestone and Hythe and controlled the airfields of Hawkinge and Lyminge. My lines were stretched and I would need further reinforcements if I was to hold out against a determined British counter-attack.

We will continue the campaign some time in the future, picking up where we left off.