Map of NATOs northern flank?

[McRuffen]

Here is my wish for the future. A map of northern Norway, Sweden, Finland and Russia. NATOs northern flank, where NATO borders with Russia (or USSR), with a couple of (semi-)neutral countries in between.

 

Now that you have mastered seasons, especially winter, the wild and mountainous terrain of the north would be an ideal place to show off the new graphics engine and ED's map making abilities. Distances are quite far (actually requiring tanking and fuel planning?) but there aren't many big cities and famous landmarks in this area, so a lot less of that fiddly stuff than with Vegas or Dubai.

 

I think it would allow for some VERY exciting WW3 or cold war style scenarios, and in the winters of the 70's and 80's, huge NATO exercises were held in Northern Norway, basing aircraft out of Bodø, Evenes, Bardufoss and Andøya, with tens of thousands of ground troops practicing for World War Three.

 

This area is home to western forces (Harriers and later Harrier II's visited Bardufoss regularly, and Bodø is an active F-16 base, Evenes has seen huge NATO fighter forces, with carriers participating off coast during exercises with F-14s and F-18s in real life), to Finnish MiG-21s and later Hornets, to Swedish Viggens, and to Soviet/Russian forces, including Kilpyarv Air Base where one of the default Su-27 skins is based. All three countries have air bases within this area, and it would be useful for all post-WW2 eras.

 

The terrain is exciting for low-level flying, the wilderness is rough, weather is often bad (but can be very beautiful as well), there are short but nice summers, cold and harsh winters, and mountains, valleys, rivers, forests and fjords aplenty to create a beautiful and exciting experience.

 

There could be interceptors launching from Bodø to intercept Soviet bombers over the ocean in peacetime (something that happens even today with F-16s intercepting Russian Tu-160s in the far north), deep strike missions both ways, Viggens operating from snowy roads in northern Sweden, deep strike and long-range patrols, escorts and interceptions, all within this cold war hotspot.

 

So my vote for the next map area for DCS is the northernmost part of Norway, Sweden, Finland and Russia!

[Kippy]

+1 from this guy. Awesome idea

[Cristofer]

A great idea. Midnight sun on the summer, no sun at all on midwinter :)

[Emmy]

How many airbases exist in this region IRL?

[Fri13]

How many airbases exist in this region IRL?

 

Finland has just one military airbase just outside south of the map. But there are three airports that are used, and then a dozens of civilian airstrips as roadbases. So you would be taking-off and landing each time to different places and having mobile ground crews servicing.

 

Sweden would have two (cold war era), but then again same thing as Finland about roadbases, civilian airstrips etc.

 

Norway would have 4-5 depending how one at south would end up to be located. No idea about their civilian airstrips, but very likely as well roadbases.

 

And Soviet Union would likely have a half a dozen or so airbases, all kind roadbases, carrier fleets etc.

[Silver_Dragon]

I remember some time ago the old "Cold War" inform of the soviet forces cross north Scandinavia and Landing on the north flank.

 

http://www.esd.whs.mil/Portals/54/Documents/FOID/Reading%20Room/Other/Litigation%20Release%20-%20The%20Northwestern%20TVD%20in%20Soviet%20Operational%20Strategic%20Planning%20%202014.pdf

[drPhibes]

Norway would have 4-5 depending how one at south would end up to be located. No idea about their civilian airstrips, but very likely as well roadbases.

 

The military airbases in the area are Banak, Andøy, Bardufoss, Bodø and Evenes. There are also 10+ civilian airports there, but they are mostly short strips of limited use for anything other than helis and harriers. Road bases are a no-go in Norway, since we barely have any straight pieces of road at all ("is there a rock in the way? Build the road around it!"), and practically none that are long (and wide) enough to land a plane on.

[drPhibes]

Perhaps it's time to pull out this old demonstration of the ED terrain tools again:

xYUHbx6hYJ8

 

Is it just a demonstration, with a randomly selected ares being shown, or is it an indication of something that might be available somewhere down the line? Let's hope for the latter.

[QuiGon]

Heatblur is making a map for the Viggen which will probably be about sweden and the baltic sea, but they also want to make a map for the Tomcat as well, which I hope will be located somewhere on NATOs northern flank (Iceland and Northern Scandinavia). An interesting suggestion for this came from Mbot in another thread which I will just quote here as I think it's a great map proposal:

My hope for Heatblur's Tomcat map is a recreation of the North Cape map from Jane's F/A-18:

 

 

It is watery and cold as previously hinted by HB. It allows among other things for the defense of Norway from a Soviet invasion and the Battle of the Norwegian Sea, which would have been the largest naval battle since WWII. 3-4 US carrier battle groups were expected to operate in this area to stop any advance by the Soviet Northern Fleet's submarine-, surface- and naval aviation-forces, as well as to support the land-defense of Northern Norway. There is room for the Northern Fleet's home base at Murmansk with it's surrounding naval aviation and interceptor bases. Once the Northern Fleet would have been attrited, US carriers were expected to move forward into the Barents Sea to strike the Soviet homeland itself.

 

As the cherry on top, the theater also works for the Viggen to defend Norrland from a Soviet invasion/incursion (the Soviets might do a shortcut through neutral Finland/Sweden to outflank NATO defenses in Norway).

Edited January 23, 2018 by QuiGon

[Fri13]

Road bases are a no-go in Norway, since we barely have any straight pieces of road at all ("is there a rock in the way? Build the road around it!"), and practically none that are long (and wide) enough to land a plane on.

 

That I thought, but wasn't sure.- As first time when I drove through Norway from South to North that while navigating via map it was easy to estimate distance-time, in reality roads were such a snakeroute that speed was so slow that it took far longer!

 

But I wasn't sure that is there such roads at all in north that could have been used.

[Boris]

Great map idea! Why aren't we funding this???

Someone shut up and take my money!

[Winterz]

I would love it!

[MBot]

I love it, it is my number one theater wish.

[Oceandar]

I remember flying over that map in DID EF2000. Making me wanna visit Norway but darn... it seems really cold and I'm from tropical climate country :D

 

Oh yes sure I agree with the idea :D

[ponhard]

Oh, yes! This would be the best thing! Even the I-16 would fit :)

[Cunctator]

+1

 

Due to the sparse habitation such a map would also be very useful to build some convincing WW2 missions. Especially since many suitable WW2 planes such as the I-16, F4U, AI Ju-88, Lancaster or Bf-109G6 are already in development.

[Stratos]

Would be a nice map for Naval Aviation, that's for sure! Oh and the Viggen will fit it there perfectly too.

Edited January 24, 2018 by Stratos

[redbrean]

+

[Northstar98]

+1 I share what others post about this being a top priority theatre - it looks incredibly promising, especially since you could do literally anything in that theatre, especially if it could be extended to the size of the current Caucasus map.

 

Like this (Measures up at ~1060x815km, total map area of ~850,000km^2, ~325,500km^2 of which being land) - that might be a little too large, but more than half of it is water and is more scarcely populated, I don't know maybe I'm too much of a dreamer...

 

Edited January 24, 2018 by Northstar98

[Stratos]

Murmansk is outside the map you posted and Severomorsk is out too, the map should be moved to the east in order to be useful.

[Farks]

How many airbases exist in this region IRL?

 

Air bases in the northern most part of Sweden during the '70s and '80s, since that's the time period of interest:

 

* 21st Air Wing (F 21) in Luleå. x2 fighter squadrons (J 35D Draken, JA 37 Viggen from 1985) and x1 recce squadron (S 35 Draken, SF/SH 37 Viggen from 1979).

 

* Kiruna. Military and civilian airport. You can still see the military flightline positions at the southern part of the runway.

 

* Jokkmokk. Military air base. This one was built to Bas 90 in the late '80s, adding three short runways just to the south-west of the main runway.

 

* Vidsel. Military air base. Also built to Bas 90 in the late '80s, with two short runways just south and west of the main runway and a third one a bit further west.

 

* Heden. Military air base. Remained Bas 60, i.e not built to Bas 90.

 

* Piteå. Military air base. Also remained Bas 60.

 

* Fällfors. Military air base. Built to Bas 90 in the early '80s with three short runways.

 

* Gunnarn. Military air base. Built to Bas 90 sometime during the '80s, with one short runway just to the west and and another two to the south-east.

 

* Åmsele. Military air base. Built to Bas 90 sometime during the '80s, with three short runways.

 

* And there were a few road runways as well. Jokkmokk (just to the east of the main base), Vidsel (also just to the east of the main base), Långträsk and Finnträsk. The road runways were technically different from the mentioned short runways, in case you're wondering. :music_whistling:

 

* A couple of civilian airports were earmarked for military use as well, namely Gällivare, Arvidsjaur and Skellefteå.

 

A couple of these bases may be located a bit too far south to be included in the suggested map layouts, but I suppose its possible to cheat a little and move them for the sake of fun or something.

Edited January 25, 2018 by Farks

[Mr_sukebe]

Ace idea. Good call OP. Would love to see that.

[Northstar98]

Murmansk is outside the map you posted and Severomorsk is out too, the map should be moved to the east in order to be useful.

 

Agreed, I had it to the west because so far we have yet to see a map that doesn't have land-borders (AFAIK Normandy has land bordering the map where there is supposed to be Ocean, so I wanted a large ocean space to work with)

 

Here is a more ideal map, it weighs in at ~1,610x940km for a total area of 1,515,000km^2 :shocking: :surprise: of which 850,000km^2 is landmass - which is over twice that of NTTR... I fear this might be an unrealistic map - feasibility wise. It would be utterly fantastic if they could.

 

 

 

Thoughts?

[Balzarog]

The title of the thread is a bit off. The only NATO Northern Flank is Norway. Russia boarders northern Norway north of Sweden. Finland and Sweden are NOT "semi- neutral!" They ARE neutral, and they are not part of NATO! If we consider the possibility of Russia invading Norway by violating Swedish and Finnish neutrality to pass through to Norway, then we must also consider the reverse of NATO doing the same to Russia. I mean it's not as though it's happened before ... WRONG. Britain and the U.S. Invaded Russia in 1918 at Arkhangelsk to help the White Russian army fight the Bolsheviks. Of course, they didn't go through Sweden or Finland to do it.

Edited January 25, 2018 by Balzarog

[MBot]

Thoughts?

 

I think this is way too big. The map in the first post is actually almost perfect. Let's think for a moment the inclusion of which important areas should define the extension of the map.

 

The western edge is easy, this is Bodö (plus always some extra as buffer). Bodö is the foundation of NATO's defense of Northern Norway.

 

The eastern edge is easy too. Most of the important stuff on the Kola is along the the north-south railway to Murmansk, which should be included. I think the eastern most airbase on the Kola is Severomorsk-3. The eastern half of the Kola is mostly empty and can be cut. The submarine base at Gremikha would have been fun, but is not strictly necessary (the majority of submarine bases are around Murmansk and are covered).

 

Now the southern edge is up for discussion. Again, Bodö is the absolute minimum. This already includes Kiruna in Sweden, so a Swedish base is covered. A little bit more south would include Alakurtti in Russia which has an airbase and is the home of a mechanized division. This would include one of the major invasion corridors into Finnish Lapland. Further to the south is Rovaniemi with an important Finnish air base. I think this would make an excellent southern edge. Pushing even further south would include more Swedish bases.