Austrian Mechanised Brigade (1980s)

The 1980s Austrian Mechanised Brigade which made an appearance earlier in the week is now complete.  The question was asked - "Why Austrians?"  The answer is that  have yet to see a post-WW1 Austrian force on a wargames table which makes my chaps pretty unusual, and that the model of the Saurer APC (by C in C) makes it feasible. 

Interestingly, nobody asked the arguably bigger question - "Why are you spending time painting tiny bits of metal prior to putting them on a table with other tiny bits of metal an pretending to fight a battle?"  But let's not go there....

The Brigade HQ, with Saurer, a 6-wheeled Pinzgauer radio van and the high-tech AA battery - an M-42!  Models by C in C, ISM and GHQ.

The assembled brigade, with HQ, 2 Mechanised Infantry Battalions, and a battalion each of tanks, AT and artillery.

One of the infantry battalions.  I used infantry from GHQ's WW2 US range.

The other infantry btl.  I had a go a painting the Austrian roundels on these Saurers.

The Tank Battalion - GHQ M-60A1.

Artillery Battalion with GHQ M-109 and C in C MAN lorries standing in for the identical OAF (MAN's Austrian subsidiary company) variants.  The Pinzgauer carrying the spotting team is a GHQ model.

And finally - the Anti-Tank Battalion.  The SK-105 'Kuirassier' is one of the more distinctively Austrian vehicles.  Mine were made by mating the turret from a GHQ AMX-13 with the hull of an M-24 Chaffee.  Aside from the hull being a bit too wide it looks more or less right.