DP10: Stand and Fight?

[Deleted]

DP	Who	Timeline	Location	Local Time	Clock Time	Event
10	Reno	J	VIC Skirmish Line DD: -107.417 45.522 MGRS: 13TCL11274386	1310	1407	Reno and Hodgson reach end of prarie. Moylan explains the situation and points out Indians are turning M CO flank. Reno orders a pull back to the rivewr "brow".

Up to this point, Reno is doing okay. Not as aggressive as Custer would probably like, but on the other hand charging into the midst of the Indian village does not appear to be the best course of action and to immediately have turned tail and run for the ford risked getting caught by the faster Indian Ponies. Custer has not told him what he is doing and for all Reno knows, could be engaged and pinned as well. No one has reported seeing Custer anywhere.

Benteen may come up, not because he has any orders, but if he hasn't found anything, he may be trying to rejoin the Regiment, but I can't count on that

COA 1

Hold In Place

Advantages

We seem to be holding our own.

Disadvantages
Enemy looks like they are trying to flank us
No support in sight.

***COA 2***
Displace to the Wooded area
Advantages
A better position than hanging out here in the open
Might be able to anchor my flanks on the river bank.
Gain concealment if not cover

Disadvantages
No obvious next position
No support in sight

COA 3
Withdraw fighting to Ford A
Advantages
We know the way back to the Ford
Ford can be defensible

Disadvantages
Have to move by company, may leave someone in the lurch
No support in sight
Flanks are open as I go back
May get pinned against the river

Comparison
None of these are very good, but I can't think of another.
Staying here is asking to be flanked.
Pulling back to the woods seems okay, but where do I go after that?
If go there and I get some support, they will have to fight their way through the enemy to get to me.
If Benteen (or Custer) comes up from my rear, then maybe they can join support the movement to the ford and secure it.
in any event, I need to leapfrog my way back, that can be rough.
I think the Ford is more  defensible.

Recommendation:  COA 3.  WIthdraw Under Pressure to the Ford.

[quincannon]

Withdraw to the timber would be my decision.

A withdrawal by company by bounds would not get half way back to Ford A. There are no terrain features that afford a withdrawing company a chance to halt, and cover the withdrawal of its neighbors. The idea of withdrawal is right under most circumstances, but in this instance there is no terrain to support that withdrawal, and couple that with the fact that the enemy is faster and more mobile than you are. Should he get five or six guys between the withdrawing company and Ford A the game is up. It would only take that few to scupper you.

Withdrawing to the timber is no permanent solution though. Ammo is going to be at 50 percent before you get there, and with each shot fired the ammo supply starts taking a nose dive toward bingo. Reno must withdraw to the timber and immediately start preparations to conduct a break out from encirclement. If he times it right and hits a detected weak point with a fist not a finger, he can bust through. If he can create a distraction such as a prairie fire that would help. All in all Reno made the correct decisions. What he did not do was properly execute the break out. He hit with a finger not a fist, got strung out and lost a lot of people. Break outs are high casualty operations anyway. You expect up to fifty percent, and hope they do not reach that high. These are hard decisions for any commander, who cares about his troops. Reno did OK, and those that blame him for what happened in the execution may be somewhat justified, but they are not justified in questioning his break out decision.

[Deleted]

It was a tough choice for me. Everyone should command a forlorn hope once.

[quincannon]

Be my guest. Most people only get a chance to do it once.

Tell you the truth Mike I have looked at this matter over the years, and I do not think Reno had any choice but to do what he did. I think he may have been a little late in determining that Custer was not coming up behind him. I have never seen anything that suggests to me that Reno saw some of Custer's people on the bluff (the Grey Horse Company) or that he viewed whomever were waving their hats. I have never heard that anyone told him about these two incidents either. Custer should have been behind Reno by about a thousand meters. I don't know what that is in horse time, but I would not think it would be more that seven to ten minutes. When he was on the skirmish line in the first few minutes, and Custer did not show, that was the only time I can see where he had a small crack in the window to possibly withdraw by bounds. After that, a WBB just was not in the cards.

[Deleted]

I agree that he did as well as anyone could. I imagine h a bing having someone's brains blown all over you plus feeling you've been deserted by your commander could cause some loss of control. His decision of when and how to leave and how he figured out to go to a decent piece of ground is mystifying. Everyone seems to like tho  to throw blame at someone instead of understanding someday you get the bear and someday the bear gets you. No matter how good you think you are or how good you really are.

[quincannon]

Those who do not know consider these people to be plaster saints that are not capable of fear or any other human emotion. Had it been me that had Bloody Knife's brains strewn all over me, I would have pissed my pants, thrown up a couple of times, and then tried my best to regain my composure.

We are all cowards, every damned one of us, and if anyone says he is not, he does not understand the depths of his soul and human emotion, and lies to himself, the worst sort of lie. Given we are all cowards then bravery is the outcome of the coward that conceals his innate fear the best.

In a larger sense though the only way any of us learn what to do, is getting the crap beat out of us, in one form or other, until the right presents itself.

Reno was no where near what some members of the great unwashed look at and see his vision of a field grade cavalry officer on the western frontier. The Bellah/John Ford character Major Alshard is their vision. Reno was really unsuited for anything more than a desk job in Chicago or Washington. He probably would have excelled at that and retained a good reputation the rest of his life. All that said in those few moments he made the only decision that had any chance of saving most of his people, and I fully believe that is all we can ask of any officer or leader.

[yanmacca]

Yeah, agree with the above posts.

Reno had to make a decision pretty quick if was going to reach ford A in any order.
Instead of organising his battalion for a withdrawal, he filtered them into the timber.
At one point, one company had troops in the woods and in skirmish and G company just walked off and left M strung out in no mans land.

With his battalion being spread out so, Reno lost all contact with his companies.

So some could say that he lost control well before M got its flank turned.

But at the end of the day who am I to judge, Reno did what he thought was right, following his orders and waiting for his support. He did get back with two thirds of his men, which is better then being trapped and used as a honey trap for Benteen.

[Deleted]

I guess it is plainly too hard to vote on these things. I think I will remove the feature in the future.

[Beth]

It's hard to vote on these things because it is difficult to ignore what happened and perhaps view it with what should have happened.

[Deleted]

Beth, then I submit, you are over thinking. On the other hand, QC, AZ, and others were trained to do that. Its perfectly okay to just say, I'll just vote the historical outcome. No one is going to die today based on your decision. Perhaps I should introduce you to wargames. Do you live near Dallas? I have a friend there ... But he's a little crazy. He is currently doing all of D-Day at the platoon level. Actually, he is a lot crazy. The game I am working on now is the 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment covering force battle in the Fulda Gap at the company (US) and battalion (Soviet) level and it only has a 1000 counters or so and the map is five feet square. He needs his whole living room. Previously, he did they battle of Kursk.

[colt45]

Withdrawing by bounds before being flanked is the right decision, if made in a timely fashion. We know falling back to the timber was a move that was not good for a long period of time, as he had to retreat shortly after entering the timber.

The key would have been Reno making the withdrawal decision before being forced to move into the timber, which occurred after his flank was turned.

[Deleted]

I think clearly we are both armor.

[quincannon]

It's a long way back to the river boys. Their tanks are faster than your tanks. There are no intermediate terrain features to aid you in a withdrawal. They are going to be on you like white on rice even if you do reach the river, not giving you any time to prepare. Good luck.

Withdrawing into the timber is not really any good either, in the long run. He had no good choice. This is one of those times where there is no right answer, no book solution.

Please do not let any previous opinion about Reno influence your views. I don't know if you have any. I don't know if they would be positive or negative, if you do. He screwed the pooch by the way he did what he did, He barely got away with his break out, but he did get away with it, and close disaster, is always the hand maiden of close success.

[mac]

Reno was handed the crap end of the stick and many commentators will not let him give it up. I spent a long time listening to nonsense about how his withdrawal let down Custer. The fact is that as he was charging from the timber (regardless of how well he did that) Crazy Horse was arriving with up to another 200 warriors. Had he delayed any longer we would all be pondering all those bodies in the valley.

I think it was QC who first pointed out to me that what actually saved Reno was not leaving the valley (that was just moving the party down the road) but the arrival of Benteen.

Custer of course had been detected by then and his presence also drew attention from Reno.

I still maintain Custer's note to Benteen was intended to bring him to Reno's aid as there is no other context in which it makes tactical/practical sense.

Considering the timing of the events there is no way Reno could have possibly held the timber until Benteen arrived in the valley; as some suggest.

Reno was handed the crap end of the stick but he did manage to hang on and save a lot of his men.

Cheers

[Deleted]

It is a long way. I think you'd have to be incredibly lucky to get away with it. But, he was, as you point out, pretty lucky anyway.

Benteen's arrival probably saved him. So, here is a thought (perhaps small): If the Indian Scouts had not motioned Benteen toward Reno Hill, where would he have gone? Up the valley? following Custer's trail? (Which I think went right over Reno's position.) If he'd gone anywhere else, he would have been chopped up too.

Mac: You are a smart guy, but that is just crazy. If I was the Custer, you were Benteen, and AC was Reno, if I wanted you to reinforce Reno, I wouldn't send you a message that says "Come quick. Big village. Bring pacs." It would be "Benteen, Reinforce Reno. Be Quick. Protect pacs."

Custer is the Regiment's main effort. You don't commit the reserve to reinforce failure, you use it to gain success. Reno is probably screwed. You can still maybe win the battle if you mass. Sadly, you may have to write off Reno, but he might get his shit together and survive if he finds good ground (which he seems to have done by accident.) Four more companies may have enabled Custer to have achieve a defensive success if he chose good ground with those four companies. But he was fixing to string himself out.

But let's put it another way. The big party is at QC's house. But I don't even know there is a party there. You are at your house and you call me up and say "Mike, Come quick. Big Party. Bring booze." Where do you think I am going to go?

I think you are putting yourself into Custer's place and saying what you would order given what you think he thinks he knows. Occam's razor applies here unless you have other evidence to bear. I don't think there is any. He doesn't even have a way to specifically direct Benteen where to go. He doesn't know where Reno is. He doesn't even really know where he is or how to tell Benteen to get there. It's not like he has a good map with grid coordinates.

On the other hand, had I constructed DP9 by deciding what orders to send to Benteen, then:

COA 1: Tell him to join the Regiment (-) (Benteen, Come quick. Big Village. Bring Pacs. Martini will guide you up.)
COA 2: Tell him to joint Benteen. (Benteen. Reno in big fight. Link up with him. Protect the Pacs.)
COA 3: Don't send him any orders. Trust him to march to the sound of the guns.

Then COA 2 is a valid choice.