`Nam: 1965-1972 The Vietnamese War
(FW910)
Vietnam. In a small corner of the world, one of the most bloody wars to be fought occurred in this small country in Southeast Asia. Traditionally framed as a war of small skirmishes, long patrols, and guerilla ambushes, there is a lot more that happened such as full-scale offensives and pitched battles.The US and its allies have all the advantages of mobility and firepower. The ubiquitous Huey helicopter has become a symbol the war itself as it carries troops into battle and unloads fire on the enemy. Heavily armed flotillas sail up the windy Mekong Delta, heavy tanks and M113 ‘tracks’ bash their way through the jungle searching for enemy strongpoints, and resolute ‘grunts’ hold firebases against fierce enemy assaults…
Meanwhile, the Nationalists have all the advantages of the home team. They fight as guerillas, choosing the time and place of major operations or surprise attacks and appearing from nowhere to ambush enemy hunting them. When the time is right, they even commit their tanks, armoured personnel carriers, and seasoned troops into the fray to achieve total victory.
‘Nam gives you have everything* you need to take command of one of these forces. Building on the success of Battlefront’s Team Yankee, these rules and forces are easy to learn and use. Within these pages you can find all of the scenarios, missions, and notes on terrain to fully brief you before you step onto your Huey to lead your troops to the landing zone!
About The Book
‘Nam! is a one-stop shop for all of your Vietnam battles on the tabletop. It includes a complete rules set, missions, and a comprehensive list of American, South Vietnamese, North Vietnamese, and ANZAC forces to play. ‘Nam! includes a whole new set of rules based on the successful Team Yankee system. This gives you a streamlined set of rules and missions so you should be getting into the jungle a lot faster than ever before. There are also updated missions as well, keeping all of the flavour of the old Vietnam missions and streamlining the mission rules for fast-paced and exciting games.If you’re a seasoned Vietnam gamer, you’ll find all of your forces are here in the book as well as some new ones, such as the USMC and elite North Vietnamese sappers. So let’s start there and dive in to take a look at what’s new, what’s different, and how to properly play a Vietnam game.
What’s New?
One of the highly anticipated forces in ‘Nam! are the US Marines. The Marines occupied the northern border of South Vietnam along the demilitarised zone. They were in constant contact with North Vietnamese forces during their entire stay in country, engaged in epic sieges, gruelling patrols, and fierce combat actions. In the book you’ll find a US Marine Rifle Company and a Marine Tank Company. The Marines have an unrivalled esprit-de-corps and this is reflected in the unit cards, giving them high morale and excellent combat ability. They have some interesting equipment as well, such as the enormous LVTP-5 amphibious transport.
Descended from the ole LVPs from WWII, this beast was designed to carry an entire platoon of marines in two vehicles, unlike the M113 which would typically carry a half dozen troops. To put that into game terms, the platoon’s transports are carrying 5 to 7 teams each!
The Marines were backed by the first batch of M48 Patton tanks to arrive in the country in 1967. The Marine tanks saw lot of action in Vietnam, often accompanying patrols on missions up to the demilitarised zone. In addition to these gun tanks, they also had the only M48 flame tanks in country, equipped with a flamethrower instead of a main gun. These were useful for reducing bunkers and clearing brush away for the patrols.
The Marines really, really loved their 106mm recoilless rifles. So much so that they had one of the oddest vehicles in country, the bizarre M50 Ontos. The Ontos was a small fully-tracked armoured vehicle that carried no less than six 106 millimetre recoilless guns! Originally built as a tank destroyer, the Ontos was frequently used in Vietnam as a bunker buster or an infantry support gun. You can take several platoons of these little devils in your Marine formations.
The second most requested force for Vietnam has been the North Vietnamese Special Tasks Battalion also famously known as sappers. These troops often led the assaults on major Free World firebases, silently sneaking into positions just prior to the battle and clearing a patch for the follow up assault forces. This gives the nationalists an elite force of their own, highly skilled and motivated to complete the mission before them. Unlike the other typical Nationalist forces they’re small units but they hit very hard.
The book also extends the game’s timeline somewhat into 1975, when the last battles were fought between the south and the north Vietnamese. This allows players to field some new South Vietnamese formations such as M48 heavy tanks that they got from the Americans after the withdrawal in 1973. We’ve also included South Vietnamese marines to the Riverine forces which were highly regarded by their US comrades during the ‘vietnamization’ of the Mobile Riverine Force in 1968/69.
What About My Old Armies
For all of us old salts, our forces from previous tours are totally compatible with the new book. In fact there are probably new ways to feel your old forces if you wanted to try something new with something old.
Battlefront Miniatures / Osprey
