TDG 05: Midnight at the Oasis

It's 2031, the age of human-machine combat teams ... While you're coming up with your plan, see if you can spot the Easter Egg.

If this is your first TDG, you may want to check out these instructions first.

The year is 2031. You command a tank-mechanized infantry battalion task force consisting of:

• A scout platoon of six light armored vehicles armed with a 30mm gun that fires HE and AP rounds effective against similarly armored vehicles to a range of 2,500m.

• A tank company (A) with a main gun effective against other tanks at 3,500m.

• Two mechanized rifle companies (B and C) on infantry fighting vehicles (IFVs) also armed with a 30mm gun and equipped with man-portable ATGMs with a range of 3,000m.

• An autonomous gun company (D) consisting of nine unmanned scout vehicles and 12 unmanned gun vehicles. The scout vehicles have enhanced sensors and .50 caliber machineguns (r: 1,700m). The gun vehicles are armed with a 105mm main gun that will not defeat the frontal armor of advanced main battle tanks but can destroy a tank from flanks or rear to a range of about 3,000m. Both vehicle types have moderate armored protection that is effective against small arms, machineguns and RPGs but not against tank main guns or ATGMs. The networked system is capable of automatic target recognition (ATR) and autonomous or semi-autonomous (i.e., man-on-the-loop) target engagement. A headquarters section commands the company remotely from armored command vehicles.

• A mechanized autonomous mortar platoon armed with 120mm mortars effective to about 10,000m.

You are fighting a mechanized enemy in a desert environment, the dominant terrain feature of which is longitudinal dunes 5-10m in height, called seifs, with steep, knife-edge ridges that are inaccessible to vehicles, either to transit or occupy. Infantry can scale them with some effort, providing observation and fields of fire for man-portable weapons as far is the next ridge. (Letter designators provided for ease of reference.)

The air domain is heavily contested. Your vehicles have either autonomous air-defense weapons (currently weapons tight) or counter-UAV systems. The electromagnetic spectrum is also heavily contested, with both sides employing both countermeasures and counter-countermeasures.

The enemy is to the west. It has been a back-and-forth campaign. You have crossed Wadi Kabir twice already, once on the offensive and once in retrograde. The wadi is a major obstacle, impassable to vehicles except at occasional crossing sites. Now the division is on the offensive again, advancing west. Your battalion will spearhead the advance on Axis Alleghany. The main attack will be further north, at Iroquois Crossing. You will cross Wadi Kabir, the line of departure, at 0230 hours, passing through the host-nation 71st Company, which holds the crossing. Alleghany Crossing is an improved, high-speed crossing site; there are limited smaller sites that a small unit could cross with care.

At 2330 hours, you are approaching Checkpoint 17 at the Alleghany-Oneida merge, heading for your attack position just west of the Eot’b (“Ee-oat-ib”) oasis. Your scout platoon is moving 2km ahead as the advance party. You try to raise 71st Company on the net but get no reply. You fly your tactical UAV over Eot’b and spot over a dozen unspecified tanks and APCs there, oriented east, and more arriving from the west—just before you lose all contact with the UAV. Your first thought is that the vehicles must be 71st Company; you wonder why they are at Eot’b instead of holding the crossing.

You try to raise 71st Company again: no reply. Now your scout platoon reports it is in contact with enemy forces about a kilometer east of Eot’b. The platoon commander estimates armored reconnaissance, company strength. He reports he is breaking contact northeast around the dune (G) for cover.

What do you do, colonel?

Requirement

In a time limit of five minutes, make your decision in the form of any orders you will issue and any reports or requests you will make. Then provide an explanation of your rationale.