Caen - Day 3

Day three of the battle for Caen, and the British had decided on a more subtle encirclement rather than the direct armoured assault. The famed ‘Desert Rats’ headed off on a flanking manoeuvre that took them through the North African desert and encountered the Finnish there. Against all expectations, and against a wave of Crusaders, the Finns held out in a ‘Fighting Withdrawal’, and achieved victory on turn 8. Such heroics should be told by the participants themselves, and with the British CO probably hiding in shame in the Sahara I suspect we are still awaiting the Finns overenthusiastic views on a battle which looked lost.

Meanwhile the road into Caen, where the British had been defeated by the 102nd SS Tigers last week, was the scene of more fighting when the 17th SS Panzergrenadiers launched an assault on British units ‘Holding the Line’. Sadly it was not a contest, the small battlefield size and high number of British ambushing units combined to block the Germans out with ease, leaving the German CO (yes that’s me) to walk await significantly embittered and muttering about level playing fields, machineguns and universal carriers.

Finally it must be noted that the war will not be over by Christmas due to the organiser suffering from other committments. Hopefully it will pick up where it left off in the new year, and for now we must go back to minor scraps over yards of France awaiting the big breakthrough.