Omaha Beach, The Cocktail

"Old men forget: yet all shall be forgot,
But he'll remember with advantages
What feats he did that day: then shall our names,
Familiar in his mouth as household words
Harry the king, Bedford and Exeter,
Warwick and Talbot, Salisbury and Gloucester,
Be in their flowing cups freshly remember'd."

June 6, 2015.

At 0630, 71 years ago, the 116th Infantry Regiment, comprised mainly of Virginia National Guardsmen, assaulted prepared German defensive positions at Omaha Beach in Normandy near the towns of Vierville, les Moulins, St. Laurent, and Coleville.  They charged from their amphibious landing craft headlong into a storm of fire, smoke, and steel.  These men were the first wave of the Allied invasion that opened the second front in western Europe.  The 116th took horrific losses, but they fought hard and gained the high ground beyond the beach, paving the way in their blood for the rest of the invasion force to launch the liberation of Europe.

I am proud and fortunate to have served in the 116th in combat (Afghanistan).  Each year around Veterans' Day, veterans of the 116th gather in Staunton, Virginia, to celebrate the regiment's proud history and honor those D-Day veterans whose bravery and sacrifice is beyond measure.  We call this event the 116th Regimental Muster.  I look forward to the muster each year for the chance to talk with the D-Day veterans and thank them for what they have done.  The first year I attended the muster there were a couple dozen D-Day veterans in attendance.  Last year, 2014, there were three.

At the muster, the tables of the D-Day veterans include an exclusive libation-a bottle of Calvados-the regional spirit of Normandy, distilled from apples.  I can imagine that my predecessors got into a few bottles of Calvados as they fought their way inland through the Bocage, the dense hedgerows of Normandy, in the days and weeks following their assault on Omaha Beach.

Here, then, is my small tribute to these great men and a salute to their bravery.  The ingredients of this cocktail are not necessarily the best available in their class, but each carefully-chosen ingredient is symbolic in some way of the experience of the 116th Regiment on Omaha Beach and beyond.  Enjoy it, and remember the 116th on Omaha Beach.  Ever Forward!

Omaha Beach
1 shot Virginia Gentleman bourbon
1 shot Calvados
1/4 shot La Belle Orange
3 dashes aromatic bitters
Twist of lemon peel
Dash of salt
Dissolve salt with bitters in old fashioned glass. Add ice and all the booze. Stir. Twist lemon peel over the top. Serve and remember the 116th Infantry Regiment's assault on Omaha Beach, 6 June 1944. Ever Forward!

New Game, New Project! Bolt Action Late War!

After I am done with NOVA this weekend, my next game is one that I picked up at Historicon this Summer: Bolt Action.

After one read through, I like what I see from the rules.  Alternating and random activations, reactionary orders, shooting, and assault rules all look to make a fun and tactically realistic game.  Just how I like it.

The game was written by Rick Priestly and Alessio Cavatore, who both had the good sense to leave Games Workshop in 2010, so the rules show great promise right from the starting gun.  Anyone who fled the GW trainwreck before that organization went from lost to pathological might actually have some talent.  The fact that the authors are billing this as a platoon-sized game tells me that they learned from one of the fundamental design mistakes that doomed Warhammer 40k to fail as a wargame.

But enough of that for now.  As a career infantryman, the two rules I like best so far, well, OK, three rules, are shooting, assault, and off-board artillery.  Shooting is not going to be decisive in one turn.  Rather, it looks like you will use shooting to affect your opponent's units over a number of turns.  Assault, on the other hand, is completely decisive.  If a unit assaults, it will either destroy its target in one turn, or it will be destroyed.  This is how it goes down in real combat: it takes a little bit of time to win a fight with shooting, but if you close into hand-to-hand, soldiers are going to start dying really fast.  Assaulting generates huge risk, and huge payoff.  If you get it right, you get a Dining Facility named after you.  If you get it wrong...well....

Then we have the off board fire support.  Alessio, Rick, I have been waiting for a long time for a good 28mm wargame with realistic indirect fire support (and CAS) that includes smoke.  Gentlemen, thank you.

So I'm off to Normandy next where I will learn Bolt Action.  I will start by building two forces, German Wehrmact troopers of the 352nd Infantry Division, defending the Normandy beaches, and U.S. soldiers from my old unit: the 116th Infantry Regiment (The Stonewall Brigade), the first Americans ashore on Omaha Beach.

Ever Forward!