Team Yankee Dutch APC Question (YP-408)

[Daeothar]

I recently got a good deal on the Team Yankee book, and was interested in the game enough to also order the Free Nations book, with in mind wanting to play (or at least build) a Dutch force.

Now, the unit choices are wide enough and do accurately reflect Dutch forces at the time, bar one glaring thing; the provided Dutch APC is the YPR-765, which had just come into service in 1985. But the bulk of the Dutch APC fleet at the time still consisted of the YP-408, which was not mentioned in the book!

And since I really like the YP-408, I'd like to field them instead of, or alongside, the YPR.

I've already found a good source for the model (Armies Army), so I'm just after stats/rules right now.

So has anyone already statted this vehicle up? Preferably including its variants, such as the TOW equiped one? Or maybe you know, through the grapevine, that Battlefront is planning to release it in the foreseeable future perhaps?

I could do them up myself of course, but I'm not yet too familiar with the system, and there's no need to re-invent the wheel, right?

[Daeothar]

(Never mind this post; just re-using another thread of mine, containing another question about this system, already resolved. No use in spamming the board with multiple threads on the same thing, right?)

[Jemima Fawr]

I can't help with the TY vehicle stats beyond stating that the armour was paper-thin, so roughly on a par with the BTR-60.  The mobility wasn't great, as only six of the eight wheels had power.  Armament was invariably the Browning .50 Cal, though the YPR-408 PWAT had a TOW launcher in addition to the .50.

Your timeline is slightly off though:  While the Belgian AIFV-B version came into service in 1985, the Dutch had already had the YPR-765 for ten years by then.  It actually replaced the AMX-VCI tracked APCs (in the 13th, 41st, 43rd and 51st Brigades) circa 1976-1980. 

The 11th, 12th, 42nd, 53rd and 52nd Brigades had YP-408 variants until 1987, when they too were replaced by YPR-765. 

YPR-765 also replaced the trucks of the 101st Brigade in 1988.

You might be interested to know that QRF also do the YP-408 PRI in 15mm, as well as the YP-408 PWAT TOW-carrier and the YP-408 PWRDR radar recce variant.

[Daeothar]

Well, I had to look some of it up, but you're right. I was only going with the information on the Battlefront site (not always that reliable, I know) and a dedicated YP-408 (fan?)site.

And to be honest; I did my extended tour almost a decade later (1995+), so by that time, the only YP-408 I ever saw was one on display at the gate of a base I visited during an exercise...

I just like the overall appearance of it, and it was still in use in significant numbers in 1985. But reading the YPR stats, and comparing them to other IFVs in the game, the YPR is a (relative) beast, so from a gaming perspective, there is absolutely no reason to use the YP-408. The YPR is one of the best, so changing it for something vastly inferior makes no sense.

Were it not that I just like the looks of the YP-408...

And I already saw that BF have taken some liberties in regard to fielding certain vehicles in the list (probably in order to round out the capabilities of the force), so I won't feel objected making some small changes myself.

Such as making the German TOW armed BO-105s in the list Dutch instead:

Feeling the increasing threat from the East, the Netherlands government, at the insistence of both its Army and Airforce, green-lighted the conversion of a full squadron of BO-105 observation helicopters, to be armed with TOW anti-tank missiles. As the technology was readily available with their German counterparts, the project was well underway in August 1985, with approximately half of the intended aircraft converted when the attack came, and all converted craft were pushed into immediate service.

A simple matter of adding KLu markings to the Bolkow miniatures. And I'll explain the skill stats being exactly like those of their German counterparts, despite the lack of training with the TOW system, by stating that those pilots were just sh*thot...

Oh; and representing the Tornado Strike Aircraft with Dutch F-16s of course. No restatting required; equivalent armaments can be carried by the F16; cannons are roughly the same, and the Tornado's MW-1 can easily be represented by other cluster munitions.

[Jemima Fawr]

Yeah the YP-408 is a big favourite of mine as well!

[Daeothar]

Well, if the Warsaw Pact nations feel comfortable fielding the BTR-60, I'm sure I could squeeze in a company of YP-408s somewhere

In fact, comparing their characteristics, they're indeed pretty much equivalent, except the BTR-60's armour is much thinner than even that of the YP-408.

I'll have to do some more comparing with other vehicles, to see where that puts the YP-408, but taking the game's granularity into account, it'll probably still be in the same bracket...

Btw: I found this helpful site, listing the entire Dutch order of battle in 1985: Orbat85, which might be a big help

[Arrigo]

One of my colleague at King's was a 408 platoon leader if I was right. He did not seem very fond of it. It has a funny shape... but the YPR-765 is much better, after all it is a sort of cousin of the Bradley (being a derivative of the private venture IFV that in turn morphed in the M2/3 series). Considering the period when it entered in service, it was certainly a revolutionary approach for NATO at the time

Battlefront sometime made egregious errors. In their NAM rules stated that in 1972 the Northvietnamese captured part of Hue and that Quang Tri was not recaptured by the South Vietnamese...  or claiming the Australian assigned individual tanks to the infantry platoons... okay Bruce Cameron in his official history of Centurions in Vietnam (a two volume work from the Army History Unit recommended even by BF... and really a good book). The Author  emphatically make a case that the basic unit was the troop, the Tanks were controlled by troop officers and never by the infantry, and backs it with the fact that deploying a two tank troop was considered dangerous and if a troop fell to less than 3 serviceable tanks it was removed from operation. On top of that, not every tank had the infantry telephone, or the telephone was working, and the only common radio net was at company (infantry) and squadron (tank) level otherwise talking... (and not only Bruce Cameron had access to the primary sources, he interviewed almost every officer who served, and he was a troop commander in Phuoc Thuy too!). Okay end of hijacking!   

Bottom line take what BF say with a pinch of salt... why the hell the ANZAC are deploying to Europe when... the main combat commitment of their troops was the 5 powers treaty and thus Malaysia, and in 1985, with 300,000 PAVN troops with all the stuff and soviet advisers in Cambodia probably defending Thailand would have been the main commitment?  And with the already available PAVN and ARVN you can even extend 1985 there, with PAVN playing themselves and ARVN being a good proxy for the Royal Thai Army (as I do?).  Sorry more hijacking. 

[Daeothar]

Ah well, considering they're New Zealand based, I can understand why they shoehorned a small ANZAC force in there; but I felt that, in such what-if scenario's, I can allow myself some leeway when trying to fit my favorite units into my list...

Thinking about it some more; as this list has only very recently been introduced, it's very likely that there will be more units on the horizon later on. But I don't want to put a lot of effort and resources into units that will be officially released a year from now.

So even though I will be creating some unit card Photoshop templates (just because I can, and tend to, for each system I play anyway ) , I think I won't be going overboard on missing units just yet; I'd better make sure I build and paint the stuff I have inbound first!

And that will not pose much of a challenge I'm afraid; all vehicles at the time were painted a monotone dark olive colour (RAL 6014), so no intricate and visually appealing camouflage patterns. Only the BO-105 has some camo, and even that's a stretch, as there were many flying at the time, in just NATO Olive Drab...

The only interesting thing will be the infantry; although the uniform in 1985 was, again, a plain olive green, helmets were often camouflaged with grass and greenery. So those at least will provide some much needed variety. FAL butt stocks (plastic) and fore-grips were also often black (either metal or plastic), but there were also a lot with wooden stocks. But then, those were often oiled to darken them, so even less colour.

The eighties were a pretty drab era...

[Jemima Fawr]

Don't forget that you've also got a lot of Centurions still knocking around at the time, for some extra fun!

To simplify things, if you're looking at 1985, here's the tank-APC mix in each brigade for that year:
11th Armoured Infantry Brigade - YP-408 & Leopard 1-V
12th Armoured Infantry Brigade - YP-408 & Leopard 1-V
13th Armoured Brigade - YPR-765 & Leopard 1-V
41st Armoured Brigade -  YPR-765 & Leopard 1-V (changing to Leopard 2A4 during 1985)
42nd Armoured Infantry Brigade - YP-408 & Centurion
43rd Armoured Infantry Brigade - YPR-765 & Leopard 1-V (changing to Leopard 2A4 during 1985)
51st Armoured Infantry Brigade - YP-408 & Leopard 1-V
52nd Armoured Infantry Brigade - YP-408 & Centurion
53rd Armoured Brigade - YPR-765 & Centurion (changing to Leopard 2A4 during 1985)

Re helmet-covers: Brown/sand hessian was used VERY commonly as a helmet cover and I've also seen this painted with green patches.  I was certainly intending to paint my helmet covers brown-sand.