Buildable and Playable Landing Forces?

[Emma de Normandie]

More of a suggestion for RTW3, or a future DLC even, I guess. Being able to build dock landing ships or amphibious assaults ships would be very fun, and it adds another dimension to the game. Being able to customize my landing forces and build very good landing support ships create an entirely different angle for the game

[wlbjork]

Large landing ships I can see being a portion of the fleet. Presumably they would need to use Merchant-type AI, maybe offer a bonus in the following scenarios:

*Time taken to plan an invasion
*Effect of Forts (both types of effect)
*Response time to colonising a neutral power
*Defensive efforts against uprisings and invasions

On the other hand though, such ships weren't really built until WW2 suggesting a mid 1930s to early 1940s introduction date.

[Emma de Normandie]

Dec 3, 2020 22:55:32 GMT -6 wlbjork said:

Large landing ships I can see being a portion of the fleet. Presumably they would need to use Merchant-type AI, maybe offer a bonus in the following scenarios:

*Time taken to plan an invasion
*Effect of Forts (both types of effect)
*Response time to colonising a neutral power
*Defensive efforts against uprisings and invasions

On the other hand though, such ships weren't really built until WW2 suggesting a mid 1930s to early 1940s introduction date.

That is an excellent point, maybe they could help speed up the actual invasion in battle as well, as these ships should be able to go faster, around 18 knots or so.

[gurudennis]

This pretty much relies on the player being able to create semi-permanent task forces. Which is something I would very much like to see in the game - along with invasion forces for sure.

[director]

True. If you were allowed to build them at present the game would throw them into shooting situations.

[buttons]

How historical is a standing force of invasion ships for the time period? I always interpreted the cost and build up for an invasion as including the construction of landing ships and specialized landing equipment as well as assembling the forces and planning the attack. Also it would be nice if size/value of the holding impacted the size of the invasion fleet and number of ships required to reach the landing zone for success. Invading the lone island of Midway shouldn't require that many ships and men, invading the Philippines or Greece or something should have far more ships launched and far more required to reach the LZ. As a spitballed scale example a level 1 holding might involve 4 transports launched and 2 need to reach the LZ for the VPs for a successful landing, a level 8 holding might involve a fleet of like 32 transports of which 16 need to reach the LZ for a successful landing.

[director]

buttons - Before the US Marines took on the problem in the 20s and 30s there were no standing forces intended to invade defended beaches (as far as I'm aware). In the inter-war period the US Marines needed a clear job description that was theirs alone (for budgetary protection) and an analysis of Japanese fortification of Pacific islands and the likelihood of a Pacific war led to the Marines taking on that specialty.

Prior to that, there were standing naval/marine/army units that could make a landing on a foreign shore, but in general they needed to land unopposed and seize dock facilities (or at least a beach) for support and supply. And again, in general, they needed special equipment and training that was not a part of their ordinary tasking. As late as the US Civil War, it was necessary to land outside the reach of enemy arms and artillery (see Burnside's successful North Carolina operations, or Grant's riverine campaign at Vicksburg), and in WW1 the Gallipoli landings were supposed to go in on undefended or lightly-defended beaches (as the Thessaloniki landings, also). The development of railroads and motorized transport meant a defender could often reinforce more rapidly than an attacker could land and organize troops, as happened at Gallipoli.

Even in WW2, Japanese naval special landing forces did not usually make opposed landings, When they did, as at Wake, things could go horribly wrong because the SNLF were lightly armed and not intended to assault a heavily-defended target.

carlcgsc.libguides.com/amphibious

US Marine studies in the interwar period (see Major Earl H Ellis, USMC) pointed up the importance of planning, combat-loading and other 'soft' technologies - all of which had to be re-learned and validated in actual combat experience; Guadalcanal and North Africa were (in hindsight) not well organized and succeeded by overwhelming force. The rapid expansion of the Marine Corps and the experience gained at Guadalcanal/North Africa changed amphibious operations from 'too complex and risky' to almost routine. This standing amphibious force, conceived in the 20s and 30s and developed in the 40s, is the first so far as I know.

That WW2 experience led to the permanent establishment of the Marine Corps as a complete combined-arms force with dedicated aircraft, tanks, infantry, carriers and support craft - a unique formation in the world, though lessened in importance lately by the expansion of air-transport for troops and gear.


As to the number and equippage of troops required for an invasion... it depends. US Marines landed on Guadalcanal with a full division (12k) which was far more than were needed for the initial occupation but too few to push the Japanese entirely off the island, and eventually barely enough to hold it against Japanese reinforcements. At D-Day only six divisions went ashore - but they were followed by as many men as the Allies could push over the beaches. The planned invasions of the Japanese islands would have featured about the same-size landing force - limited by landing craft and supply, not manpower.


US and British production of landing ships and craft was repeatedly bumped up in priority, but due to various factors there were just never enough (mechanical and combat wastage, transit time from one point to another, theater commanders holding onto them rather than releasing them for further operations). As an example, the Allied landings in southern France were supposed to go in at the same time as the Normandy landings but were repeatedly delayed for lack of landing and support craft (in part because of D-Day, the Pacific and Anzio). Japan, Italy and Germany tried to develop amphibious capabilities, of various quality and usefulness, but they did not put in the resources as the Allies could. The German invasion of Norway was largely by stealth and airdrop; Japanese amphibious operations were aimed at seizing port facilities that were lightly defended, or entirely open. When the Germans really wanted an amphibious capability they did not have one, nor did they have the time and resources to develop one before Britain improved her air and land defenses so as to make a landing impossible.


I do agree with you that it should require more men to take the Philippines than, say, Malta... but if we really get down to it, only two or three powers have the wherewithal to develop amphibious forces to any great extent, those being the US, UK and - as an outside prospect - Japan. Germany in WW1 conducts no amphibious operations and in WW2 takes Norway and Crete; Italy (maybe) can count Albania; Russia and France... not really. So for game-play we do not perhaps want to get too far down in the weeds here.

[oldpop2000]

U.S. Marines landing at Nassau. (Credit: Naval Historical Center) The first amphibious landing in Marine Corps history came on March 3, 1776, when a force under Captain Samuel Nicholas stormed the beaches of the British-held island of New Providence in the Bahamas.

Seems like the Marines have been accomplishing this for a long time.

[wlbjork]

The first beach invasion would have been when one proto-amphibian told another to "take that beach" to paraphrase Sir Terry Pratchett.

The Persians intended a naval invasion of Greece around 450BC that resulted in the battle of Salamis, for example.

[director]

The original question was, "How historical is a standing force of invasion ships for the time period?"

The US Marines did not have a dedicated, standing force of invasion ships until the 1940s - nor, as far as I know, did anyone else.

[wlbjork]

The British built X-Lighters in 1915. These were based on London barges, with a spoon shaped bow, a ramp and was armoured against bullets. 5 were known to have particpated in the Dunkirk evacuation. The Spanish purchased 27, of which 11 survived the 1936-1939 Civil War.

The Russians built the similar Bolinder-class which weren't successful, then created their own Elpidifor-class which was a better design and had a successful career being also adopted as minesweepers and gunboats.

In 1920, Britain built the Motor Landing Craft which was capable of carrying a medium tank and unloading it directly to the beach. By 1930, the RN were operating 3 such designs - which did see action in WW2.

The USN and USMC were carrying out their own research and development in amphibious warfare which resulted in the creation of the Fleet Marine Force in 1933, though they didn't adopt the Higgins boat until 1939.

There weren't any major amphibious forces in existence - which isn't overly surprising due to their specialised nature and the recession of the 1920s - but there are centuries of amphibious landings to call on as well as more than three decades of the existence of a landing craft with a ramp. That isn't to say that the capability to build such a force didn't exist however.

[tbr]

Dec 11, 2020 10:37:21 GMT -6 director said:

Germany in WW1 conducts no amphibious operations

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Albion

On the contrary, Germany did conduct the "best" (by performance metrics and ultimate effect) large (division+ size) amphibious invasion of WWI...

[director]

tbr - thank you for the information, that's a new one to me.

[vonfriedman]

In WW2 Germany developed a highly effective 240 ton landing craft: the Marinefaehrprahm. See en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marinef%C3%A4hrprahm. Several were built in Italy and some remained in service there after the war. The Italians produced also a few platoon sized landing motorlaunches. They were provided with a high forward ramp, as it was planned to attack Malta in 1942 from the south, landing on a coast with cliffs. It was even thought to use firefighter ladders and a battalion of firefighters was trained in anticipation of the landing, which was later canceled. See wsimag.com/it/economia-e-politica/19542-larmata-dei-pompieri

[buttons]

Dec 13, 2020 0:47:32 GMT -6 wlbjork said:

The British built X-Lighters in 1915. These were based on London barges, with a spoon shaped bow, a ramp and was armoured against bullets. 5 were known to have particpated in the Dunkirk evacuation. The Spanish purchased 27, of which 11 survived the 1936-1939 Civil War.

The Russians built the similar Bolinder-class which weren't successful, then created their own Elpidifor-class which was a better design and had a successful career being also adopted as minesweepers and gunboats.

In 1920, Britain built the Motor Landing Craft which was capable of carrying a medium tank and unloading it directly to the beach. By 1930, the RN were operating 3 such designs - which did see action in WW2.

The USN and USMC were carrying out their own research and development in amphibious warfare which resulted in the creation of the Fleet Marine Force in 1933, though they didn't adopt the Higgins boat until 1939.

There weren't any major amphibious forces in existence - which isn't overly surprising due to their specialised nature and the recession of the 1920s - but there are centuries of amphibious landings to call on as well as more than three decades of the existence of a landing craft with a ramp. That isn't to say that the capability to build such a force didn't exist however.

Well yes amphibious landings existed for a long time, even opposed amphibious landings, however since dedicated landing ships of any buildable scale are largely outside the game's timeframe it makes little sense to represent buildable landing forces, at least as standing formations. Most I could see is giving the controlling player more control over invasions, they build landing ships when at war just like AMCs, more ships means more men and supplies means a faster invasion, and as long as they have a bare minimum of ships to launch the invasion the AI will ask them every turn that weather permits whether or not they want to invade, when the player accepts they get an invasion battle with the landing ships they have completed and have in the sea zone. After the war landing ships are broken up for scrap or sold off as civilian ships.