Israeli Infantry and Magach 2 tanks (FOW)

My custom Israeli Infantry have been sitting on my painting table for months. Finally with the release of Fate of a Nation I decided to finish them up. Then what happens, as soon as they are done Battlefront releases there great Israeli Infantry sculpts. Well it looks like I should start working on updated infantry lists for all the '67 armies to go with Fate of a Nation.

The miniatures are from Peter Pig and are their professionals. I then chopped off their heads and replaced them with BF and Peter Pig US infantry heads. I saw this mod on another blog but can't remember which one.

Infantry in the Golan heights.

I have a couple of MG teams in the works for the mechanized platoon.

They all have FAL's.

I also have several RPG teams as well.

Finally, I have taken my old M48's with the 90mm and removed the Vietnam tank commander and created my own custom Israeli commanders. The makings on these tanks are incorrect, but I'm waiting on the Battlefront decals before I update them.

Magach 2

The new commander.

Supporting the Infantry.

Khurasan T-55 vs. Battlefront T-55 (FOW)

There have been a few reviews of Khurasan's T-55 tanks going around so I'll keep mine brief and let the pictures do most of the talking.

I recently picked up three of Khurasan Miniatures T-55's to compare with my 10 Battlefront T-55's. Below are some pictures of the models and a comparison of the two.

Khurasan T-55 all bagged up.

The Khurasan Miniatures T-55's have resin Hulls, tracks and turrets with only the barrel, AA MG, and small bits in metal. The Battlefront T-55's have only a resin hull and turret, the rest is in metal.
The detail is good on both, with Battlefronts being a little more pronounced and therefore visible at 15mm.

Khurasan in the foreground, with BF T-55 in back.

Khurasan on left, BF on right.

The BF tank is a little taller than the Khurasan.

I like the HMG on the Khurasan tank more than BF, but neither is very sturdy.

I left off one of the fuel tanks on the Khurasan T-55.

The BF T-55 is wider.

The Khurasan T-55 has the option of no fuel drums, empty brackets or full drums on.

The hull on the BF tank is longer, but the tracks are almost the same.

So in review, both are great kits. I would probably recommend buying all of one or the other and not mixing them as there is some size difference. Also there is a weight difference as the Khurasan tanks weigh far less than the BF ones. As for price, both are similar in cost, but Khurasan sells individual tanks and group packages whereas Battlefront only has boxes of 5 or 3 for now. I will be checking out the BF Egyptian T-55's next, since mine are all the Vietnam versions. Although all of the photos I've seen of T-55's in 1967 don't have the fuel tanks in combat. 

Battlefront M51 Ishermans Review (Pt.I)

I've been waiting on Battlefront's M51 since the first day I started researching the Arab Israeli conflicts. Back then it was just a dream, so I made due with Quality Castings M51 Shermans... they were less than impressive. Then word came that Khurasan Miniatures was working on the Yom Kippur War and I was hopefully they would show the old Israeli Shermans some love. Finally Battlefront announced Fate of a Nation and I knew the big bad Isherman was on its way.

After rather impatiently waiting on them to finally arrive I have at least assembled a few boxes of M51's. Here is my Company Commander. I drilled out the .50 cal mount and added a brass tube to make it stronger. And as per norm for me, I chopped up a few tank commanders and did headswaps to get my crew.

All in all a great kit, just what I was waiting on. If I wanted to nitpick I would have preferred the mantle and barrel be one piece like the M48 and M50 Sherman miniatures.

Below are some comparisons between the Quality Casting M51(painted) and Battlefront's (unpainted).

Now if we could just get the decals...

Egyptian Attack (AIW)

This weekend I played in an X-Wing Tournament at the shop, but afterwards we were able to get one last game of Flame of War for the Six Day War in, with my rules, before Battlefront releases its new booklet. It was a 1500 point game of fighting withdraw, with the Israeli's defending.

The Egyptian force consisted of:

1 - HQ T-55
9 - T-55's
5 - T-55's (proxied with IS-2s)
9 - T-34/85's
4 - ZSU-57's

Confident Trained

The defending Israeli's were:

1 - HQ M50 Shermans
3 - M50 Shermans
3 - M50 Shermans
3 - M51 Ishermans
3 - M48 Pattons (90mm)
4 - AMX-13's
Priority Vautour air support

Confident Veteran

Joel played the Egyptians, Mathew played the Israeli's and I helped them both out, since neither had played any Arab Israeli Wars FOW.

A wall of steel, ready to roll out.

Israeli's ready to hold the line.

The board.

That's intimidating...

I think early on I should have let Mathew know that the M50's would have a lot of trouble dealing with the T-55's from the front. He placed the AMX's in ambush.

Some of the only Israeli tanks that can touch the T-55's from the front.

Moving forward under an anti air umbrella.

Moving through the pass.

Forward!

One of these things is not like the other.

I'd be hiding to if I was in a Sherman.

Why aren't we M51's?

The T-55's bag a Patton...

And a Sherman.

The first turn saw the entire Egyptian force move up and take out 1 Patton, 1 M50 and 1 M51. Not a good start for the Israeli's.

The Vautour gets through the flak.

A few dead Egyptian tanks, but there are a lot more.

One of the precious M51's burns.

The Israeli's return fire is largely ineffective. With semi indirect fire they hit with almost every shot. But the M50's can only bail at best and Joel rolled very well for armor saves from the bigger guns. In the end the pattons killed one T-55, the M51's killed one T-55 and Air killed two and bailed three T-34's.

Continuing the advance.

The high velocity 75mm gun on the M50's just isn't enough.

Going for the right most objective.

Two shots connected and the last two M-51's burned, dang those stabilizers.

Joel continued to push up the Egyptians aggressively and was rewarded by killing the remaining M51's and another M50. Mathew knocked out another T-55 with the Pattons and bailed a few more, but it looked like he couldn't stop the Egyptian juggernaut. Air snuck through and killed another couple of T-34's.

Fire in the Sinai.

The AMX ambush comes out but can't contest both objective.

So they go for the shots against the T-55's weaker armor.

One last gamble, but they only killed one T-55.

The reduced T-34 keep moving.

The Patton's just couldn't kill enough T-55's, but they did shrug off lots of hits.

The IAF has one last chance to kill the T-55's on the right objective.

But the ZSU's shot the fast mover down.

With that it is a 6-1 Victory to the Egyptians.

Mathew was making a list mainly based on what miniatures I had finished so that many M50 Shermans verses a horde of T-55's is certainly not ideal. He is already eying an Israeli Centurion list.

Having been so busy at work lately I haven't had much time to play or work on anything, but watching this game has gotten me fired up for AIW FOW again. I have several boxes of BF's new M51's preordered and think I will pick up the Magach box as well.

Also Khurasan Miniatures has finally got their Yom Kippur War line going and will have a ton of miniatures that can work for the Six Day War as well, link to their stuff HERE. They will be a great way to add individual tanks to your list, since BF currently only has them in boxes. They will be producing almost everything you need, eventually.

So between Battlefront and Khurasan, all the tanks used in the later AIW's should be produced in amazing quality, Yeehaw!