MIMIC WARFARE

Hokitika Guardian, 9 February 1929, Page 3

MIMIC WARFARE

ELABORATE BATTLE PLAN. NAVY AND AIR FORCE TO COOPERATE. AUCKLAND, February 13. A, spectacular battle which will take place on February 14 will help to decide the destines of Auckland as far as they are involved in sliemcs of defence. For the .first time in the New Zealand military forces, the Navy and Air Force will cooperate in practical exercise. Red Beach, three-quarters of a mile south of the Orewa, will he the scene of a landing by a hostile force, which appropriately is named red. The blue will be the defenders, who will ho represented by a skeleton force of engineers. It is to he assumed that the red has seized the Great Barrier as an advanced base, whence, with H.M.S. Dunedin. Diomede, Laburnum, Veronica and Wakakura, the commander dispatches his division represented by the First Battalion Auckland Regiment, Northern Depot Engineers, Signal Details and Royal Marines, to seize the port of Auckland. The troops will embark from Devonpert per medium of a ferry boat, and will board the warships in the stream. They will carry blank ammunition, water bottles filled, and one blanket per man, about 600 of them. Furthermore, the Wakakura will tow a. barge laden with material for a pontoon pier 50 yards long, which the engineers undertake to erect in an hour. Guns and horses will have to stay out of this fight, hut the peir will he strong enough to carry field guns and teams. Everything will be carried out under service conditions. The ships, with duo regard for other craft, will secretly proceed between Tiritiri and the mainland and will move toward the beach in line abreast. At alwut the six fathoms line they will anchor, and then the troops in various “flights” will transfer to the boats, which in strings of two or three will be towed by motor launches or cutters toward the land. The beach is of a shelving nature with, a good hard sandy bottom, and when the towing boats cast off, oars will he used until boats ground, when the infantry, cilad in denims for the occasion, will spring out and wade about 130 yards to the assault at the landing. There will Is? the bombing of guns from the warships, the firing of blanks, while the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve in launhces will put up a smoke screen between the warships and the shore army. Aeroplanes will co-operate in the attack.