"Belorussia 1944" by David Glantz, My First eBook Experience

I enjoy reading good military history books and war gaming what's in them. Also enjoy the reverse: war gaming some historical battle and then getting to read books about it.

HPS Simulations is one of my favorite companies for war games/simulations. Their Panzer Campaigns series features battles spanning all WWII. In their "Minsk 44" title, Panzer Campaigns puts you in the thick of one of the most dramatic battles of WWII, the battle for Belorussia in 1944.

David Glantz, one of the most prolific and respected authors on Soviet military history, has written a wonderful book about the very same battle: "Belorussia 1944: The Soviet General Staff Study". David Glatnz's books are not for the casual reader. They are studies in the military art, with profusive details on troop movements, command and control, logistics and the peculiarities of each country's way of waging wars. Both dense and lacking the narrative beauty of other authors like Atkinson, Glantz's books though contain the stuff the hardcore enthusiast of military history cherishes.

David Glantz's "Belorussia 1944" and HPS's "Minsk 44" form a great and enjoyable combination.

Instead of going the usual Amazon.com route, this time I decided to buy "Belorussia 1944" as an e-book from eBooks.com. Purchasing the e-book was a breeze and after the required installation of reading software from Adobe (Adobe Digital Editions), I was reading the e-book a few minutes after paying online. I don't particularly like any of Adobe's software in general because it asks you for updates every single time, but that's a personal peeve. Also, it's a bit disconcerting that both the printed and electronic versions of the book cost the same.

The "Belorussia 1944" book itself didn't disappoint. Very good read and perfect to understand what's being war gamed in "Minsk 44". The only thing that I am disappointed about is how the maps show in the electronic version. Many of Glantz's books contain maps that are hand-drawn and relatively small. These do not compress very well with the image-processing algorithms used to make e-books. The customer support people of eBooks.com were very gracious in trying to get me better resolution of the images, but unfortunately these small figures are helpless.

Cheers,

Steel Beasts ProPE v2.46, Back in the Hatch

I got my Steel Beasts ProPE v2.46 past Wednesday, but it was not until today that I got a chance to install it and take a ride. In a short time, I'm going to post some more detailed impressions about the upgrade. On the meantime, let me tell you that the new Abrams 3D model is a beauty. See clickeable screenies below.

Steel Beasts ProPE v2.46 Upgrade: Second Video by Sean

The second of the two videos showcasing the new stuff in Steel Beasts ProPE v2.46, again courtesy of Sean (forum admin. at the official eSims' forums). Thanks Sean!

Steel Beasts ProPE v2.46 Upgrade: Video by Sean

I actually linked you to this video in a previous entry.

Sean (administrator of the Steel Beasts Official forums and author of the video) has been very kind authorizing me to post both of his videos showing the new features in Steel Beasts ProPE v2.46. Thanks million Sean!

Second part is coming in a future entry.

Steel Beasts ProPE v2.46 Upgrade: Shipping Now!

For the charges of not being up to date in following the news on the upcoming upgrade of Steel Beasts ProPE: guilty as charged, your honor ...
Also, guilty as charged on procrastinating my pre-order of the upgrade at a discount price.

This morning I purchased the upgrade and I noticed that the discount rate didn't apply to my purchase. On closer inspection the eSim store has the full upgraded version of Steel Beasts ProPE already listed. I rushed to the official eSim forums and found this post made yesterday by Ssnake, stating:

Well, actually the packing will take most of the weekend. Shipping will start this Monday.

It is very likely the upgrade CD is shipping already for those who pre-ordered.

Cheers,

UPDATE: Tom tells us he received his upgrade copy. See comment below. It's happening. Thanks Tom.

Contemporary Military Thinkers: William S. Lind

Mr. Lind is an outstanding scholar and military thinker. His seminal work on "third and fourth generation warfare" will be part of the study of warfare for generations to come.

While I don't subscribe to his cultural conservatism and immigration views (I am an immigrant to the US from Argentina, legal immigrant if you are reading this, Mr. Lind : ) ), his articles on military matters are visionary.

His book Maneuver Warfare Handbook is one of those books to which I always come back to re-read and find something I missed or haven't thought enough about.

He writes a column in the Defense and National Interest website (see it also listed in my "Blogs of Interest" section) named "On War" (link to this week's On War here).


Cheers,

DCS Black Shark: Tactics?

After spending some time getting used to fly the virtual Ka-50, the next natural question is how to use it properly in combat.

As you know, I am a big fan of reading articles/books/doctrinal publications/etc with accounts from real life and then applying that into my war gaming-flight simming.

When it comes to attack helicopters, any of the military superpowers out there appears to be continuously changing their tactics and doctrine.

Unfortunately, it is not easy to find information about real life Russian doctrine, tactics or employment of their attack helicopters. In future posts I will try to expand on whatever meager stuff I found on the net. On the meantime I would like to link you to an interesting article I found in the web about the use of attack helicopters in the anti-air role.

The link to the full article is here:

Air Defense with an Attitude: Helicopter v. Helicopter Combat

(Click on the link on the right of "Proxy Url" thingy and it will download as pdf document)

Cheers,

War over the MidEast: Assorted Screenies

Finally I could get some quality time with HPS Sims' simulation of air warfare, War Over the MidEast.

Don't be fooled by the brief interface, this thing is quite deep and it will take me some time to write something that makes sense.

On the meantime ... screenshots!

Battle Group Commander: Episode One Review at Out of Eight

James Allen, concise, to the point and most importantly spot on as always, has posted a review of Battle Group Commander: Episode One.

Cheers,

Steel Beasts ProPE Upcoming Upgrade Featured in Video

Steel Beasts ProPE, the holy grail of modern armored warfare simulations is preparing an upgrade of its current version.

New and exciting features are included in the upgrade.

Please visit this thread at the official eSim forums.

Cheers,