White Star/Red Star- Playing Games over Korea

[Eric Farrington]

I plan on running a series of games with my buddy for the air war over Korea. I will have a scenario or two intended to capture each of the main periods of the war the evolving nature of the conflict. We'll see how it goes.

We will be using the Tumbling Dice 1/600 aircraft miniatures with Litko bases. The rules will be White Star/Red Star which can be found on the Wargame Vault.

Dateline: June 29th, 1950
Location: Suwon Airfield, Republic of Korea

On June 27th, an attack by the North Korean KPAF 1st Air Division on Suwon Airfield had been thwarted by F-90 Shooting Stars. Despite this loss, the KPAF returned to the attack on the 29th. This time, the American defenders were a group of F-51 Mustangs. US Military leaders were on hand at the nearby town as part of a conference. They were able to witness the defense of the base first hand.

These attacks led to Gen, MacArthur to authorize air sorties to attack North Korean targets in order to establish air superiority.

This will be a classic engagement from early in the war. I could not really find any information on the North Korean attackers, but knew that the objective was to attack ground targets and that the North Koreans were equipped with a lot of IL-10's. Those would be of little value in a CAP. Therefore, I decided to use more "fighter" oriented planes for this sortie.

Forces:

USAF
4 F-51 Mustangs with Experienced Pilots



North Koreans
2 Yak- 9 with Rookie Pilots
2 La-9 Fritz with Experienced Pilots



These miniatures are from the Tumbling Dice 1/600 range. Very affordable and they paint up nicely.

Mission:
A simple Combat Air Patrol.

Set-up:
1 MU will equal 1 inch and the board will be 48 by 48MU.

There is no difficult terrain on the board. However, there are 4 cloud banks. There are 3 cloud banks jumbled together at High altitude, and 1 smaller cloud bank at Combat altitude.

In this case, the USAF is the Attacker. The North Koreans are focused on getting to the air field to strafe targets. The Mustangs arriving lead to a dogfight instead.

Weather, sortie type, and Attacker were all determined using the methods found in the main White Star/Red Star rulebook.

If you are so inclined, you can read all about the battle on the Blood and Spectacles blog here:
bloodandspectacles.blogspot.com/2023/10/battle-report-white-starred-star-cap.html

I will post additional battle reports from this project here if there is interest in the project and the games. Thanks for looking!

[Eric Farrington]

Dateline: November 21th, 1950
Location: MIG Alley

By August of 1950, UN forces had taken Pyongyang and the North Korean air force had been silenced. However, the war continued as UN forces closed in on the Yalu river border with China. B-29 bombers were hitting targets across North Korea. However, the entire war changed when Chinese forces attacked the UN in October throwing back the Eight Army However, the 1st Marine Division engaged near the Chosin Reservoir and reached the Yalu on Nov. 21st.

Far East Air Force (FEAF) aircraft supported these counter-attacks and defensive actions. B-29s and assorted fighter-bombers continued to attack targets of strategic and tactical value. It was in November that a flight of F-51 Mustangs first encountered the Mig-15 by the Yalu River. However, soon the Communists were contesting air superiority across the North with this new threat.

With that said, we will be playing an engagement between Mig-15s and USAF aircraft. We rolled up a Sortie and got a Bomber Interception mission. The Mig-15s main role was to stop the bombers from getting through!

Forces

USAF

3 B-29 Super Fortress
- Experienced Pilots

2 F-80 Shooting Stars
- Experienced Pilots



Soviets

3 Mig-15s
- Experienced Pilots




Mission:
Today's Sortie is a Bomber Intercept mission. Each Bomber that escapes off the table counts as a Kill for the Attacker.

Set-up:
1 MU will equal 1 inch and the board will be 48 by 48MU.

There is no difficult terrain on the board and the weather is clear.

In this case, the USAF is the Attacker. The Russians are the defenders.

Weather, sortie type, and Attacker were all determined using the methods found in the main White Star/Red Star rulebook.

If an aircraft is off the base, it is at Low altitude, on the base is combat altitude, and on a dice is High altitude. I won't be following the details on a turn by turn basis. Instead, I will break it down into three broad phrases; Maneuver Phase, Battle Phase, and Endgame and try to cover the battle in broad strokes rather than turn-by-turn, aircraft by aircraft detail.

You can read the full after-action report on the Blood and Spectacles Blog here:
bloodandspectacles.blogspot.com/2023/11/battle-report-white-starred-star.html

[Eric Farrington]

Dateline: April 12th, 1951
Location: Northwest Korea, MiG Alley

In early 1951, the Communist forces were able to dislodge UN forces out of the Kimpo area. This success also led to an increase in Communist air activity in northwest Korea; MiG Alley.

April 12th, 1951 was nicknamed "Black Thursday" after 30 Mig-15s engaged and attacked 48 or so B-29 Bombers in MiG Alley. The Bombers were escorted by F-80s and F-84s that were no match for the Soviet aircraft. Several B-29s were lost or damaged. No MIGs were lost. This caused bomber operations to cease over North Korea for three months.

Today we will be playing another Bomber intercept mission similar to our last engagement. However, this time we will be using a few more defenders and attackers and see if we get a different outcome from the historical, Black Thursday results.

Forces:

USAF
3 B-29 Bombers - Experienced Pilots
4 F-84 Thunder Jets- Experienced Pilots
4 F-80 Shooting Stars- Experienced Pilots



Soviets
4 MiG-15s - Experienced Pilots
1 Mig-15- Ace Pilot



Mission:
This will be a Bomber Intercept sortie with the USAF as the Attackers. They gain a kill for each Bomber that makes it off the board.

Set-up:
Today we are using 1 MU = 1 inch on a 72MU by 48MU across board.

However, the sky is overcast at High Altitude, meaning that Detection is harder for aircraft at High Altitude and shooting is reduced to Combat range only.

For fun and flavor, we scattered some Low Altitude terrain across the board at random. These will only impact flying at Low Altitude.



If an aircraft is off its base, it is at low altitude. If it is on the base it is at Combat altitude. If it has a dice behind it, the aircraft is at High-altitude. As usual, I will be breaking the game down into three phases, Maneuver, Battle, and End phase. I will not be tracking the turn-by-turn action as it makes recording the game and playing it easier.

You can see the results of Black Thursday on the Blood and Spectacles blog here:
bloodandspectacles.blogspot.com/2023/12/battle-report-white-starred-star-april.html