15mm Egyptian Mech Infantry for Fate Of A Nation

UAR Mechanized Infantry from Battlefront

Ok, ok, so I am officially diverted. Not that it takes much - I have a pea-brained attention span when it comes to this hobby. I have been painting away for much of the late winter and "spring" on my Legion Project, but as Prairiecon 2014 approaches, I put down the GW stuff to do some 15mm Arab-Israeli war stuff for the Yom Kippur War game we will be running at the Con.  The items were drawn from a big order of Battlefront stuff I had made back when they came out with the "Fate Of A Nation" supplement last fall.

Assault rifle stands and BTR-152 APCs

A few tanks led to some APCs, which led to some AAA guns, which led to...well, I just figured I might as well get everything built and based, and just paint a bunch of it while I'm in the mood.  So here is a platoon of Egyptian mechanized troops in 15mm from Battlefront.

This isn't even a whole selection on the UAR force chart...it's 1/3 of one...

These troops are from the Six Day War in 1967, which is the subject of "Fate Of A Nation", and not the 1973 Yom Kippur War, which has been my interest so far. But these would not be terribly out of place in a 1973 game, and at any rate, I want to try "Fate Of A Nation" so I might as well paint this stuff up.

A "Blindicide" team...what's with all the Belgian AT weapons in the Middle East? Did Belgium have some kind of special anti-tank crown corporation?

The gaming allure of the 1967 war is similar to that of the 1973 one in that you can legitimately fill the table with tanks, but I want to get some infantry in there as well so I started with the Egyptian mechanized foot sloggers. 

BTR-152s - the SUV of 1967...

The UAR infantry castings are OK - I suspect highly similar to Battlefront's NVA/PAVN castings from their Vietnam War range, although I don't know for sure. That's a fun thing about 15mm scale...with some slight changes and different paint, you would never know the difference when it comes to a lot of the infantry...the sculpt quality is a little worse than Peter Pig, same with the casting quality, but not by much.  And the thing I like about a Battlefront pack is that you get pretty much everything!

A surprising amount of detail on the interiors...well done on that score

The BTR-152 APCs are OK...they are mixed metal and resin, like a lot of Battlefront stuff.  My only gripe is that the resin walls of the troop compartment were pretty thin, and three of them broke in the package, requiring some careful repair (one was too far gone, so it gets to be "battle damaged" - I'll worry about that one later).  Also, some more thought should have been given to the front wheel wells in the resin mold - they are not straight, and end up set to point the wheels inward.  It looks a little funny when you seen the vehicle from straight on, but basing the vehicle obscures it enough.  Besides - Soviet-era construction was a little whacky, after all...

Apparently 28 guys squeeze into these two vehicles...I bet that is a lot of fun...

And so here are six infantry bases and a blindicide bazooka team (apparently the Egyptians did not use the RPGs in 1967) along with a pair of BTR-152s to use for a ride into battle against the IDF.  This does not even comprise an entire selection in the force chart - I will need at least one more group similar to this, as well as the command elements (MGs and recoilles rifles).

Spare tire on the back...nice touch

How much more stuff do I have? Well, for the Egyptians, more infantry and lots and lots of tanks - T-55s, IS-3s, PT-76s, and some BTR-50PKs to boot.

One more pic of the bazooka team

For the IDF? Well, you don't need a lot of them for a "Fate Of A Nation" game, it seems.  I already have a pile of M51 Sherman tanks and also Centurions painted up.  I want to add a mechanized infantry platoon for them as well.  I'm hoping I can knock all of this stuff off by the end of June...barring further diversions, that is...