Monday, January 22, 2024

The Polish-Soviet War

The blogging function on the Wings of War Aerodrome has been changed, not allowing for pictures to appear within the blog, and posting pictures upside down, so I will be blogging about my various Wings of Glory projects and gaming here!


Yeah, I need an intervention as I have plenty of projects to work on, but this one intrigues me. At one time I was going to do a 1792 Russian-Polish War project in 15mm, but alas the company that started making the figures never released more than a few packs, and the project withered on the vine. But as part of that project I read a bio on Andrzej Tadeusz Bonawentura Kościuszko and find the chap fascinating. Since I cannot game the 1792 affair, I CAN game the 1920 war, in which American and British pilots formed a squadron in honor of Kościuszko.

I have two books now on the Kościuszko Squadron. I have a pair of Table Top Flights Ansaldo A.1s to paint. I picked up a Sapozhnikov Sopwith Snipe. I made a trade with camelbeagle for a Polish Sopwith Camel repaint. I plan on getting one more Sapozhnikov Snipe to do a minor "repaint." Based on this I would say that this is enough!


The Ansaldo's are fast and good diving aircraft, and balanced with a Camel, these three Polish crates might be a nice mix against two Snipes. The Snipes utilize a fast and maneuverable deck, and Sapozhnikov should have an ace ability or two as he had four kills during World War One and two in the Russian Civil War. The Kościuszko Squadron pilots should have at least single ace ability as well - they are referenced to being well trained several times in the book Kościuszko, We Are Here!: American Pilots of the Kosciuszko Squadron in Defense of Poland, 1919-1921. This just might turn out to be a balanced three on two game, and a five or six player game is about all I like to manage on the table top!

UPDATE:


While not a lot has happened on this front in terms of getting aircraft painted, I was able to grab a Sopwith Camel repaint that camelbeagle picked up I believe from an eBay purchase (if the Camel in the picture was painted by one of the members of this forum, please let me know!). I know of at least one Camel in the Kościuszko Squadron that was brought in by one of the British members of the unit, however the artwork I have seen has the squadron insignia closer towards the tail, and does not show a red cowling...but as this plane has a spiffy paintjob already on it, I am leaving it alone!

For the pair of Soviet Snipes, I will most likely leave one as is and paint some sort of distinguishing feature on the other...perhaps adding red to the cowling and/or adding a red section to the upper wing.

I have slapped a little paint on the Table Top Flights Ansaldos (like weeks and weeks ago). The focus now will be to complete these two aircraft and then create a scenario using all five aircraft.