RCAT Falklands at Connections UK 2015: A Tale of Two Carriers

Caveat. The aim of the sessions during the Connections UK Games Fair was to introduce new players to the Rapid Campaign Analysis Toolset (RCAT), not to run detailed reconstructions of the Falklands War. Hence we did not take the detailed notes and photo-record that we would during a full RCAT event. Game play was relatively fast, loose and fun to keep events moving at an entertaining speed. True to its analytical roots, RCAT threw up a number of insights but, because we did not take accurate records, and despite retrospective efforts to reconcile facilitators’ recollections, some details below might be slightly inaccurate (especially from the beer-fuelled evening session…). It’s the fundamental insights arising rather than the detail that are noteworthy.

Each game took 2 ½ hours. Turns represented 24 hour periods, and Turn 1 was 22 May, with 3 Cdo Bde ashore at San Carlos and the logistic inload starting. Common to both games was the fact that the weather was bad on 22 May but good on 23, 24 and 25 May; this allowed a historical replication of Argentine air attacks, which started in earnest on 23 May 1982. The turn sequence is used below to illustrate the differences between the two games, the variances with historical reality and comments recorded during the RCAT Operational Commanders’ Test (OCT; see previous blog) with (as they were in 1982) Brig Julian Thompson and Cdre Michael Clapp. Argentine air losses were not recorded at Connections UK but are simple to calculate using RCAT mechanisms.

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Both games. Bad weather prevents all but a few locally flown (Pucara) and ineffective air missions. The UK players concentrate on getting stores ashore, especially for the ground based air defence (AD) in anticipation of…

Game 1. Massed Argentine air strikes claim two picket ships (HMS Antrim and Brilliant) to the north of Falkland Sound and HMS Alacrity in San Carlos water; three ships sunk or crippled on the first day of air attacks. Argentine Special Forces start operating immediately against the Amphibious Objective Area (AOA), targeting the logistic inload and slowing it down. UK domestic support and political will drop considerably, triggering a direct order to immediately attack the nearest Argentine position: Goose Green. Support for the UK among the International Community (IC) wavers, but remains ‘high’.

Game 2. Massed Argentine air strikes on the Amphibious Task Group (ATG) result in severe damage to RFA Fort Austin, but she is not sunk. Sea Harrier (SHAR) CAPs over the carrier battle group (CVBG) fortuitously prevent a Super Etendard Exocet attack, but this still causes jitters among the UK players.

Historical reality. HMS Antelope was damaged in San Carlos Water by two unexploded bombs. One then exploded while being defused and she caught fire and sank the next day. The order for ‘more action required all round’ that resulted in the Goose Green action was actually given on 26 May (see below).

OCT comment. Thompson and Clapp commented that they had expected up to five ships to be sunk during the initial day of Argentine air strikes. This was the ‘worst case’ figure briefed back to London – and actually occurred during the OCT! See third post down here for the OCT blog.

Game 1. Reacting to the losses among the inshore ATG the previous day, the UK players move the CVBG closer to the Falklands to increase the effectiveness of CAPs over the AOA. CAPs are maintained over the CVBG, but the weight of effort goes to protecting the landing site. Unfortunately, the Argentine players had already decided to switch their focus onto the CVBG! RCAT can model air and maritime combat using a completely aggregated, semi-aggregated or shot-by-shot approach, depending on the detail required. At Connections UK we used the semi-aggregated model, which determines: chance of CAP interdiction – target determination – chance of successful strike – calculation of effect. In simple terms, and without explaining the data provenance or assumptions (all of which we would do transparently in a ‘real’ RCAT wargame and, critically, would be subject to immediate and subsequent scrutiny and SME judgement), the calculation that led to HMS Invincible sinking was:

A4 Skyhawk escort and Super Etendards evade Sea Harrier CAP = 60%

Random target determination = 1 in 18 ships making up the CVBG (5.5%)

Successful Exocet strike, penetrating Invincible’s and her supporting escorts’ defences = 33%

Chance of Exocet strike crippling/sinking Invincible = 50%

Imagine the groans (UK) and cheers (Argentina) as successive d% rolled through these outcomes! Combine the percentages and you get 0.6 x 0.055 x 0.33 x 0.5 = 0.54% chance of HMS Invincible being sunk or crippled. Now, I know that the maritime experts among you will questions some of those figures and assumptions. The point is not that these percentages are absolutely accurate, but that the RCAT wargame threw up the ‘so what’ question of a carrier being sunk, somewhat to the embarrassment of the Argentine player rolling the dice! Interestingly, the chances of the Atlantic Conveyor being sunk within the RCAT system are similar.

The RCAT Consequence Management phase sees UK domestic support and political will plummet (following on from the three ships lost the previous day). Likewise UK support across the IC, while that for Argentina, particularly among pro-Argentine countries, rises significantly.

Game 2. With the UK CVBG standing off well to the east, and well protected by CAPs, the Argentine players concentrate again on the ATG in the AOA. While many Argentine attacks are prevented by shore-based (primarily) and ship-based AD, numerous bombs strike home. All targets were selected randomly due to the inability of Argentine pilots to pick their targets at leisure. However, all hits fail to cause major damage except two bombs that strike RFA Fort Austin, sinking the already-damaged ship. If those two bombs had struck other targets… The net result was one ship lost (Fort Austin).

Historical reality. Landing Ship Logistic (LSL) Sir Galahad and LSL Sir Lancelot were badly damaged by unexploded bombs while RFA Sir Bedivere was slightly damaged by a glancing bomb, all in San Carlos Water.

Game 1. With UK domestic support and political will plummeting, negotiations start with Argentina. Support from pro-UK countries for the British has fallen so pressure is applied on the UK to discuss terms. Essential supplies of war stocks such as Sidewinder missiles and warship chaff are likely to be less forthcoming. Conversely, pro-Argentinian support has risen and the availability of Exocets on the international arms markets is likely to rise.

Game 2. The Argentine players launches Super Etendards (Exocets) and A4 attacks on the CVBG, but these are either interdicted by CAPs or the Exocets fail to hit. Note that this attack was similar to the one that sank HMS Invincible. Preparations begin among the UK players to launch a well-coordinated major attack on Goose Green with two commandos/para battalions plus considerable artillery, air and Naval Fire Support in three or four days’ time. With the Atlantic Conveyor inbound with plentiful helicopters the UK land forces will then be helicoptered forward via the northern route.

Historical reality. A similar attack to the HMS Invincible sinking above sank the Atlantic Conveyor. HMS Coventry was sunk and Broadsword badly damaged. It is noteworthy that the RCAT odds of sinking the Atlantic Conveyor and HMS Invincible are similar, and both were realistic possibilities.

OCT comment. These losses and the continuing ability of the Argentine air force to launch attacks led to the order on 26 May to ‘do something!’ Although Goose Green was ‘off the line of march’, Brig Thompson was ordered to defeat the Argentines there to establish physical and moral ascendency over the Argentinians and to mitigate the potential wavering of UK domestic and political support.

The two games briefly described above (many details have been omitted) might be considered approximate ‘best case’ and ‘worst case’ outcomes. The key decision was to move the CVBG nearer the Islands, but the ensuing outcome was the result of dice rolls.

Imagine if the games had been played at Ascension Island in April 1982. As Julian Thompson and Michael Clapp said at the end of the RCAT OCT: “We liked [the manual simulation] very much and wish we had had such a system in Ascension with Fieldhouse, Moore, Trant, Curtiss, Woodward, Comd 5 Bde and us sitting around the map table thrashing through possible courses of action and, hopefully, agreeing a thoroughly well-considered plan.”

One obvious dilemma/trade-off dramatically illustrated was whether to keep the CVBG well off to the east or move it closer to the Falklands to increase CAP coverage over the AOA. Sandy Woodward said that he “was the only man who could have lost the war in an afternoon” (by losing a carrier), and protecting the carriers was paramount. Why, then, were Thompson and Clapp assured that air superiority would be established and maintained over the Islands?

A few of the ‘so what’ questions that should have arisen from such a back-to-back (or more) playing at Ascension, as occurred at Connections UK, are:

• What will be the effect of losing a carrier? Shades of Midway!
• Are Exocet targets randomly determined?
• Will air superiority over the islands be assured? If not, so what?
• How effective is the ‘picket ship’ tactic (could the T42/22 combo have been envisaged before the shooting war started)?
• Will the Argentine pilots have time to target specific ships or will attacks be random?
• How many ships are we likely to lose, best case, worst case and most likely?
• How can Argentine Special Forces attacks against the AOA, and logistic supplies in particular, be prevented?
• Can the Argentine land forces launch an immediate counter-attack against the AOA?
• Do we need to defeat the Argentine positions at Goose Green? If so, what forces will be required? See the OCT blog for the modelling of Goose Green and the commanders’ reaction to that.

It’s rare that a course of action can be played through back-to-back like this. The fact that two very different, but still credible, outcomes resulted from facing similar Argentine tactics reinforces the utility of rapid manual simulation. These wargames took 2 ½ hours each and concentrated on a critical aspect of the campaign; a full play through of the entire campaign takes a day. ‘So what’ questions arising can be examined in detail after the wargame, using reach-back to SMEs if necessary. Ideally, the answers would then become inputs to another series of rapid wargames.