Operation: Fallen Sparrow
On 24 January 2004, Airsoft Georgia and Team Blackjack hosted Operation: Fallen Sparrow in Athens GA.
This was the first operation fully promoted and hosted by Team Blackjack. The backdrop of the operation was a coup that had occurred in the Ukraine, placing a communist regime in power, lead by a radical and fanatical general. NATO has sent in a combined special forces unit known as Glass Fox to assess the situation, gather intelligence and prepare for an interdiction force to arrive.
The first mission, Bold-Anvil had an MI-6 agent carrying highly classified and time sensitive material with an SAS team trapped in a local village, trying to escape the Ukraine. Enemy forces had moved into the area and cut them off from their escape route. The SAS agents had put false mine field signs up to try and keep the enemy forces out of the part of the village that they were hiding in. One of the Ukraine patrols did however spot an SAS lookout and moved into the village to engage them. The SAS team, seeing that they were out numbered and out gunned hid the hard drive that the MI-6 agent was carrying before fighting to the very last man. Meanwhile, the Glass Fox team was meeting heavy resistance at a natural choke point in the terrain. Though they gave the Ukrainians a fight, they did not get the SAS team out. The Ukrainian team never did find the hard drive either though they may not have been fully aware of it's presence.
The second mission, Cold Ax had Glass Fox moving in to a satellite communications relay station to destroy it. The Ukraine side was moving to the same station with the objective of making minor repairs to get it back up and running after a small attack from freedom fighters damaged it. The Ukraine team got into the station and began repairs while they put out patrols. The Glass Fox team seemed to get a little bogged down for a while but then they charged in what I would call nothing short of a very impressive assault for territory. They eventually drove the Ukrainian side back so far that their spawn point had to be moved as it was over run. In the end, the Ukrainians held on to station but the Glass Fox team had the Ukrainians nervous enough to request that they wire the antenna to destroy it so it doesn't fall into enemy hands. Both sides did very well on this mission in my opinion. There was some very impressive fire fights.
The third mission, Shattered Grail had the Ukrainians transporting the recently detained Dr. Grovsk to a secure facility to be interrogated about his role in a suspected espionage incident. Glass Fox had the mission to rescue the doctor and get him out of the country, hopefully before he was successfully interrogated. The Ukrainians got the doctor to the secure facility and the SDU officer/interrogator and his team arrived shortly thereafter. The interrogation, while not too lengthy, went on for quite a while with the doctor sustaining many injuries during the process. (It was great! I have to thank Nick and Tony from team CRASH once again for playing such awesome interrogators and thanks to our own Balin Deloach for playing the scientist so well.) The scientist eventually broke under the onslaught of interrogation techniques used by the ruthless SDU officer. After sustaining several broken ribs, a cigarette-burned eyeball, many bruises and abrasions and an injection of drugs into the neck (Ouch!), he informed his captors that he had arranged to deliver the new experimental cruise missile (Dark Sparrow) with it's new nuclear core using a new fissionable material to NATO. The interrogators passed their newly acquired information up the chain of command an awaited orders on how to proceed. Mean while, the KGB mole (Thanks to Ed (Templar) of Red Phoenix for doing such an awesome job of playing his role as well!) was providing passwords, frequencies, call signs, pass codes and all sorts of good information to the NATO side. Some NATO forces infiltrated the Ukraine lines of defense and opened fire on the facility where the scientist was being interrogated. Guardrail (the KGB mole) took his opportunity, grabbed the scientist under the guise of trying to get him under cover and moved out. Followed by two other members of his unit, he walked a short distance before turning and firing into both of their chests at point blank range with his side arm. Both the scientist and the KGB agent then raced through the forest trying to get to friendly lines. (This all occurred just five minutes before the Ukrainian team was about to receive the order to terminate the scientist!) Both were shot and wounded but as the KGB agent fell he fell in such a way as to shield the scientist from Ukrainian fire coming from behind. Both wounded but right on the front lines the scientist called out for help while the KGB agent was killed by Ukrainian fire. Under a hail of fire, one of the Glass Fox medics reached the scientist and drug him to safety. The medic then patched the scientist up ad a small security force spirited him away from the battle to the extraction zone. Once what remained of the Glass Fox element reached the extraction, they dug into a defensive perimeter until their extraction occurred about tem minutes later.
Everyone played wonderfully and the games were pretty intense. Due to general consensus of the players, the fourth mission was not played. The fourth mission, Dire Saber, would have had both teams searching the area for the downed Dark Sparrow cruise missile so that they could remove the guidance system and the nuclear core. Perhaps we will run this scenario in the future.
The raffle went very well. We raffled out more than $800.00 worth of equipment and gift certificates. The prizes were:
Provided by Airsoft Atlanta
G&P Mid-Cap M-16 Magazines x 3
G&P Mid-Cap MP-5 Magazines x 3
G&P Tactical Flashlight System
Tactical Vest
Provided by Airsoft Extreme
$100.00 Gift Certificates x 2
$50.00 Gift Certificates x 2
Provided by Airsoft Georgia
Tokyo Marui MP5SD5
The day got off to a late start due to a decision to wait for some of the teams that had not yet arrived. This put the operation behind schedule and caused some other scheduling issues. There was way too much down time in between missions as we tried to coordinate the briefings, issuing props and placement of props on the field. There was some miscommunications with the meal schedule as the day became more dynamic. The unlimited re-spawn of the Ukrainian side caused some major unbalancing between the teams in hind-sight.
We have identified the issues that detracted from the event and will correct them for future events. Over all, most everyone seemed to have a good time which is all our goal really was anyway. Thanks again to all the players, teams, sponsors and last but certainly not least thanks to Chuck for having the Airsoft Georgia field available for everyone to use.