Photos of the Simbas

Here's a collection of photos of the Simbas, or more accurately soldiers of the Armée Populaire de Libération.  This is the best of what I have been able to find so far.

The army was in theory divided into regular units.  Like the ANC  these were unités d'operations and unités de garnison.  Additionally there were irregular militias called barriéres.

The Simbas were typically well motivated but lacked discipline and their command was often chaotic.

Some Simbas were termed 'Jeunesse', i.e. youths or young ones.

These next few are stills of Simba prisoners from the the movie Africa Addio.  There are some accusations of staging against the film but it looks pretty authentic.

I used the Gancia t-shirt from the screenshot above as inspiration for painting the Simba in the centre of the group below.

I added a Simba style monkey-hide hat similar to the one worn by this 5 Cdo mercenary to a TAG African Militia figure.

This last still is the only one I could get of an armed Simba in the movie.  The live Simbas are only seen moving rapidly at distance.  Very sensibly in my opinion, given the copious rifle and machine gun fire coming their way.  Interestingly he looks to be carrying an FN FAL or possibly a G3.  Most of the Simbas above look to be carrying older Mauser types or FN-49 rifles.

These are some of the Simba leaders.  To start is Patrice Lumumba, the first prime minister of an independent Congo.  He was deposed and murdered after just a few months in office.   The Simbas fought in his name.

From left to right. Jean-Sébastien Ramazani, Laurent Kabila, Gaston Soumialot and Adrien Kanambe.

Nicholas Olenga

Président Christophe Gbenye, left, and Général Olenga.

Pierre Mulele, who had trained in China and led a Maoist faction in Kwilu province.

The famous Cuban revolutionary Che Guevara arrived too late in the fighting to effect much actual change but has great what-if potential for us wargamers.

These last couple are from later after the fall of Stanleyville, when the Simbas were reduced to a hard core of guerrilla fighters in the jungles and mountains.  

Sadly, nobody makes any 28mm miniatures of these unique fighters except Grubby Tanks and they just take your money without ever sending you anything.  So, I have had to find substitutes or try some conversions.

Congo Crisis Vehicles

Here are some links to the vehicles I have found for my Simba Rebellion and Congo Crisis project.

 

 

This is really just a quick placeholder for now.  I wanted to share some picks for this thread on LAF, so I thought I would add a post.  I might add more detail here or future posts later.

 

 

The Mercenaries, Simbas, Congolese army and other factions used a great mix of vehicles from Jeeps, Land Rovers, military trucks, civilian trucks and some armoured vehicles like M8 Greyhounds or M3 White Scout Cars.

 

This truck is Citroen U23 from the later 50s or early 60s.  I don't know for definite they were used but it looks the part.  Well hopefully will when painted olive drab.

 

Here is a 1:50 GMC like truck.  I have one on order but it hasn't arrived yet.  

 

Additional Note: Carlos on LAF has now informed me this is a Soviet Ural 4320 made by Technopark.  So, widely used up to the modern day but too late for the Congo.

Carlos also suggested, as an alternative, that Solido do make 1/50 GMC trucks.

 

Here is the cheap plastic 1:48 Willys Jeep kit I have used.

I'll investigate more into the armoured vehicles later.  I know Empress, Warlord and Rubicon do some suitable models.  Brigade miniatures in the US do too I think.  I got some crew figures from them, as well as some from Empress and some from Dixon.

Here is a link to Swedish site with come good Congo pictures.

Wild West China

The Dog Meat General sends his forces west against the wily mountain people.  These fiercely independent Muslim tribesmen will not be subjugated easily.

The warlord's forces are divided into two columns that attack either side of the river to converge at an ancient crossing place.

Badly trained and with poor morale the General's forces are well supplied with modern weapons.  The tribesmen are better fighters but cautious.

The mechanised column breaks through to the ford.  It has been a costly but welcome victory for the Chinese.

The tribesmen are driven from the east bank but melt into the hills to regroup and return to fight another day.

ADLG first full try

I played my first full one-on-one game of Art de la Guerre ancients rules last week.  100 points of my Numidians versus 100 points of Hellenistic Greeks commanded by my club-mate Freddy.

My Numidian army was:

• 5 Light Cavalry with Javelins, two of which contained my integrated competent generals
• 4 Mediocre Imitation Legionaries
• 4 Javelinmen
• 2 Light Infantry with Javelins
  

The Greeks were:

• 4 Hoplites
• 4 Mediocre Hoplites
• 1 Greek Peltast Javelinmen
• 1 Peltast Light Infantry
• 1 Cretan Archers
• 1 Slingers
• 1 Thracian Javelinmen
• 1 Greek Light Cavalry
• 1 Greek Medium Cavalry
• 2 Independent Competent Generals
  

Both players were still new to the game, so play was a bit slow but we had a blast and were mostly getting the hang of it by the end.  There's a long way to go to be good though.

The Greeks get quite a wall of spears and my infantry isn't great, so I placed my mediocre Legionaries on my left and the bulk of my cavalry of my right.  My intention was to delay contact with the best Hoplites whilst my Legionaries ground through the mediocre Sicilian allied Greek Hoplites.  My cavalry would range out wide looking for gaps to get onto flanks or behind the spears.

Freddy regretted putting his cavalry on the closed flank.  It might have been better to have my light infantry on the hill too but they were actually quite useful in the end.  Essentially we both made deployment mistakes.

 

The 100 point deployment isn't very wide, so my light cavalry started facing the side in column.

This is after a turn's movement.  Both armies advanced quickly, pushing their light troops forward

My mediocre legionaries, sadly my best close combat troops, faced off against the mediocre Sicilian hoplites.  Truly a battle of titans.

With the overlap and impact, I thought my legionaries would cut through the Sicilian hoplites quite quickly but a fist of ones later and the Thracian were the ones who had done the cutting.

On the other flank the Javelinmen, having seen off the Greek skirmishers fell back before the hoplites facing them to try and buy time for the legionaries and cavalry to do their work.

The legionaries slowly ground down one unit of mediocre hoplites but the Greek cavalry launched an attack on their flank.  On the other wing the Javelinmen had run out of space and turned to face the oncoming hoplites.

My light cavalry could easily out-manoeuvre the Greeks but struggled to destroy them.

Running out of space and with a hoplite unit turning to aid their Sicilian comrades the Javelinmen had to try to fight up close.  It didn't go well for them.  Some of the cavalry broke off from the flank fight and came to help.

In the final phase the Numidian light cavalry ran rampant behind the Greek lines, launching two successful attacks. The first slammed into the flank the Greek medium cavalry on the Numidian left.  Then a mirror image attack against a hoplite unit on the Numidian right.  Both targets units were routed but the hoplites on the other wing made short work of the Numidian Javelinmen in close combat.  

A count of break points at the end of this turn found that both sides had simultaneously reached their break point and the game was declared a draw.

I really enjoyed the game and the rules.  It's a very tactical but that was fun and you do get battle lines that slowly disintegrate, which felt historical.  The single dice roll-offs lead to some wild swings of luck, and 6-1 results can be frustrating, but things even out and those are the fortunes of war, even in miniature.  We will be playing ADLG again soon.

More Chinese and some tanks

A few more pictures of our back of beyond troops.  A Chinese warlord army tussles with the red army.

The forces of the Chinese Warlord known as the Dog Meat General advance to the attack.

The new improved, well armed, and distinctly regular Red Army is ready to engage them.

Things didn't end well for the armour.  The Chinese FT-17 was hit repeatedly by Bolshevik artillery.  

The Red Mark IV (ahem not historical but I'm going to get a Mark V) were chased off by the Chinese infantry and then taken out by their field gun.

I think that's it for BoB battles for a while but more to come later.