Kiwis in Italy – Two Crossfire Battle Reports from Bruce Stewart

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Bruce Stewart has a collection of Kiwis for the Italian Campaign. He posted a couple of Crossfire after action reports on Facebook and gave me permission to repost them here. One of them is for my own 2 Companies a Side – A Generic Crossfire Scenario. The second is a scenario from the Italian 1944. Bruce games with 1/56 figures and 1/48 – 1/50 vehicles. Being from Facebook these are predominantly photographic reports.

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A Case Study in Balagan Thinking – How I justify collecting Japanese

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If you didn’t know, Balagan means messy or chaotic. And lately my head has definitely been balagan. I’m trying to justify building up a Japanese force for Crossfire. I’m trying to find ways to fit the Japanese into my Official Focus of Spain, Portugal, New Zealand, and Israel. I’ve got to say, it ain’t easy. But with quite a lot of mental gymnastics I might manage it.

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Long Range Desert Group of WW2

Major R. A. Bagnold, Royal Corps of Signals instigated the Long Range Desert Group (LRDG) on 10 Jul 1940. It’s main purpose was long range reconnaissance in the Libyan desert. The men quickly gained a reputation as the best navigators in the desert during WW2. The LRDG operated from Sep 1940 until Mar 1943. Technically it was part of the British Army but initially at least the LRDG was staffed by Kiwis of the 2 New Zealand Division.

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Sources for New Zealand’s Involvement in WW2

An annotated bibliography for Kiwi involvement in WW2. The primary source for this subject is the The Official History of New Zealand in the Second World War 1939–1945 (NZETC, 2005). It is very comprehensive extending to 50 volumes when I last counted – although many are general NZ history rather than WW2. It is available on-line, and if you search around you can find hard copies.

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Kiwi Vehicle Camouflage during WW2

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During WW2 the 2 New Zealand Division adopted British camouflage patterns on their vehicles. This is one of my WW2 Painting Guides. I focus on the Italian Campaign because this is my particular interest. The illustrations are a small selection from Jeffrey Plowman and Malcolm Thomas’s books of the Kiwi Armour series. These are great resources with many more illustrations. I recommend them.

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