Hjemmeværnet (The Danish Home Guard) - Part 3

Today, it's all about the my Hjemmeværnet anti-tank team.  These are not part of the basic infantry platoon but under the Battlegroup system you get Platoon Support Options - which are basically company level assets that have been assigned to the platoon.

In my Danish list, one of these assets is a anti-tank team armed with a 84mm Carl Gustav MAW.

The MAW gunner is an Elhiem figure, while his two riflemen assistants are Wartime Miniatures

Currently these are the only Platoon Support Options I have for my Hjemmeværnet, but I do plan on finding a suitable figure for a medic, and I have yet to decide if I'll use the Wartime US Late War mortar team as my Home Guard mortar team.  They are moving rather than firing so I'm umming and ahhing at the moment.

Anyway - that's all my painted Home Guard for the moment - but Part 4 will have something a little different...

Thanks

Richard

Hjemmeværnet (The Danish Home Guard) - Part 2

Alrighty then...  Now to some actual miniatures!

First up, the majority of the miniatures you'll see here today are from Wartime Miniatures from here in Australia.  These are really lovely, crisp figures and I can't recommend them enough.  As always, I'll say up front, I'm no expert, so in my opinion, these figures exude the the look of late WW2 US infantry.  Many are really cold and grungy looking, like you might see in the movie "Fury" - most of these I had to exclude as they were a bit more grungy than what I wanted my Hjemmeværnet chaps to look like.  They still look pretty cold though...

As I said previously, I did some simple green-stuffery to the helmets on all the figures.  Here's the Platoon Command:

I did front & back photos for just this unit, to help get the idea of want they looked like.  Two of the figures, the two to the left (which I think are the officer and radio operator) have had netting added to their helmets.  The centre right chap (an NCO?) has had some scrim added to his helmet.  The chap on the far right was an experiment to see if I could do helmet covers like Elhiem does.  Answer - NO!

Now the first squad:

First row: NCO with SMG (weapon conversion), MG42 machine gunner (Elhiem figure), BAR gunner, rifleman

Second row: 4 more riflemen

Second squad:

First row: NCO with rifle, MG42 machine gunner (Elhiem figure - with netting helmet), BAR gunner, rifleman

Second row: 4 riflemen (two are the same figure - but I did different helmet styles to make them look a little unique)

Now a bit of a close up of the SMG armed NCO to show of the weapon conversion:

And a view of what I tried to arm him with:

And here's a spare rifleman figure, in case one squad decides not to upgrade a rifleman to a BAR gunner: 

So that's the actual platoon by my TO&E.  I do have one support option painted up - but that's for tomorrow!

Thanks

Richard

Cancon 2017 Stash

Just a quick update as yesterday I was able to pop down to Canberra to go to Cancon for a look-see. Nothing super exciting on the 20mm Cold War front - although I must say I saw some very nice 15mm Team Yankee armies in action - with some kit still unavailable in 20mm - such as the LARS-1.  (Hint Hint if anyone is listening out there!)

Anyway - I still managed to snag a couple of bargains.  First up this 1/72 Amercom Sea Harrier

So that's one model I won't have to buy/build now - although I'll need to do some surgery to this to make it look a bit more flying about and looking menacing, rather than just come into land.

Next (and last) is a couple of old issues of the Strategy & Tactics magazine I've been after for a while:

I now have most of the Cold War issues, although I'm still after the NORDKAPP issue.  $30 for these was pretty good.  They are in terrific nick - someone has really looked after these.  Then, of course, I found a copy of the Berlin '85 issue I got from Ebay - similar price but this one looked much healthier - but I didn't get it.

So I also got a little bit of WW2 stuff and some Renedra bases for SAGA, but managed to talk myself out of any other purchases... What's becoming of me???  Must be getting old!

Anyway - I managed to take some proper photos of my Danish Home Guard today so they'll likely appear here tomorrow.

have fun

Richard

Hjemmeværnet (The Danish Home Guard) - Part 1

I had originally planned this post to mainly be photographs of my newly finished Danish Home Guard figures.  However, ongoing renovations at home have turned my office into a bit of a tip and a storage area for everything that's had to be moved in the house.  So - bottom line, I can't take decent photos, but can still paint stuff - so photography has gone to the bottom of the pile while painting has remained steadily on top.

What this all means is that I've started the year pretty well painting wise - and should have some stuff to show off once my office has been declared safe to enter.

So today is more of a background post than a standard update.

So... why the Danish Home Guard?  Well I stumbled across the Danish and Norwegian Home Guard whilst doing my customary reading on the Cold War.  Both are interesting organisations as each was an outgrowth of the national experience during World War 2.  In the case of the Danes, it was an expression by those who served in the Danish Resistance Movement of wanting to protect the Danish people from a government, which in the war had handed over Danish citizens to the Gestapo.  They did not want the same thing to happen again if the Soviets invaded.

So the organisation was set up, independent of the Government and the Military, but headed by a representative of each - and it sits under the Ministry of Defence, only coming under direct Military command in time of war.

By the mid eighties, the Home Guard was still using the hand-me-downs of the Royal Danish Army - and in many cases this meant surplus US Army WW2 era weaponry such as the M1 Garand and the M1 Helmet, like the one this Danish Royal Army soldier is using/wearing:

Other weapons used included ex-German MG-42 GPMGs:

and the Danish built Hovea M/49 SMG (seen below carried by the two Home Guardsmen in the middle left - held pointing down):

At first I will be creating a standard Home Guard platoon, mainly equipped with M1 Garands.  For this I will be using Wartime Miniatures Late War US Infantry.  Sure the webbing is kind of wrong (with the main inaccuracy being it seems the Danes have the handle of their entrenching tools pointed upwards rather than the American downwards)

Mine will all be pointing down!  Some of my figures will also have M1 Carbines - but my argument will be that's it's all they could get their hands on...

All the helmets seem to be covered in netting at least, so I'll have to rectify that (and that's something I can do at least!)

I'll also have to do at least one conversion, to rid a US NCO of his Thompson SMG and replace it with a Hovea SMG.

In the future I hope to convert some more Wartime figures into a Special Intelligence Patrol - which is a kind of Home Guard spec ops LRRP unit who's troopers look like this:

But that's a job for the future - when I've worked out how to scuplt a boonie hat.

So that's - hopefully next week I'll be able to take some photos of the platoon and post them up.

Thanks

Richard

The Shape of Things to Come - 2017

I was hoping to have a few newly completed minis to show you - but the weather is stinking hot and I couldn't survive taking photos in my office so it will have to wait.  I have a few (loose) plans for the year and thought it might be amusing to show them here in photographs with no commentary - some will be pretty damn obvious, while some may not be quite so.  To help I'll list them by nationalities.

Let's see how many you get:

Now I'm not promising to do everything on the list - but I hope to (and other stuff as well!).  Some of the figures have already started to be painted (some I don't have yet) - most of the kits have been built and are just awaiting painting.

So here's to a productive year!

Have fun everyone

Richard