Sahel Conflicts: Insurgent Heavy Weapons

 My terrorist force for Mali continues to expand with the addition of some more heavy weapons.

First up is a mortar team, designed by Quartermaster 3D for their Iraqi line, and printed by JJG Print 3D. The set comes with two figures, but I've added a third crew member sine that's the standard for Bolt Action. I've also included a sperate spotter to call in strikes from his cell phone. 

The DShK heavy machine gun was also procured from the same source as above. The kit only includes one crewman, so I have again bumped it up to three members, and also added a resin ammo crate I had.

Lastly is a second technical, this time from Empress Miniatures. Rather that get another heavy machine gun, I opted for the ZU-23 anti-aircraft gun. You have a few head options available for the crew, but I didn't think any looked right for my force. Using a photo of Malian militia on motorbikes as inspiration, I opted to use plastic heads from Warlord's 8th Army and Natal Natives sprues. I didn't glue the ZU-23 into the truck, so it can be shifted around in the bed to indicate the correct firing arc, and also deployed independently.

While I like the ZU-23 model, I have to admit I was underwhelmed with the truck and found it lacking in detail when compared to my Footsore technical. The Empress truck includes no side mirrors (mine came from the bits box), there is no detailing in the truck bed (added in some plasticard), and the rear bumper needed a step (plasticard again). In my opinion, that's poor showing from Empress. 

Rather than being based on the common Toyota Land Cruiser 70 series like the Footsore counterpart, this technical is built on a smaller truck frame (maybe a 90's era SR5?). Compared to the Footsore truck, the width and length aren't too significantly different.

However, what is significantly different is the height of the cab. While the Empress technical does sit closer to the ground with smaller wheels, it feels like a 28mm figure would never fit inside the cab.

Here is a kneeling heroic 28mm figure (same size range as Empress' own miniatures) and as you can see, the figure would be bumping his head against the ceiling even without accounting for a seat.  In my opinion, this is a really irksome design error that makes the technical look undersized on the table when placed next to other vehicles.

In conclusion, I give a big thumbs up to the Quartermaster 3D figures, but find myself once again disappointed with the Empress moderns. It's a real shame, as I have figures from their other ranges and absolutely love them. 

Sahel Conflicts: French Special Forces and Malian Army

The western aligned forces have expanded again, with the addition of elements from the French 1st Marine Infantry Parachute Regiment (1er R.P.I.Ma) and the Malian Army.

First up is a special forces version of the VLRA truck from JJG Print 3D. This is a fairly large vehicle, approximately 12cm long and 4.5cm wide, when printed in 1/50 scale. A 1/56 version is also available. 

The crew is sold separately, and to fit the figures in the cab, you will need to trim back the feet and also temporarily cut out the steering wheel to position the driver.

Despite JJG packing the box well, the trip across the Atlantic still resulted in a lot of breakage, with all of the guns and side mirrors being broken off, and 3 out of 4 wheels also broken. The front assembly took the worst of it, being shattered into 5 sperate pieces before I pinned it back together (I also got the rear tire glued on incorrectly at first, though I finally noticed and fixed it on the final model). JJG did include some extra machine guns and mirrors, which helped significantly with repairs. The only item I couldn't put back together was one of the handles on the grenade launcher, so I did my best to build a new one out of wire. 

One very odd thing about the crew is they are undersized, being only 25mm foot to eye (89% of the 28mm infantry figures). I don't know if this was due to a printing error or if it's intentional to fit the 1/56 version of the truck, but I felt the final visual of the figures in the 1/50 truck was poor when compared to the P4 and the infantry.

The smaller size also caused some issues in placing the figures in the truck, particularly for the grenade launcher turret. The gunner wouldn't seat properly, so I ended up placing him with the rear machine gun and adding an extra P4 crewmember I bought near the turret (who still had to stand on a box to be tall enough). That said, I think it won't be immediately noticeable when looking down at the table.

For the special forces infantry, I went with a 6-man squad along with a 2-man sniper team from JJG.  These were also damaged in transit, with all but one barrel broken and replaced by wire.

For aesthetic reasons, I decided to only use Multicam on the uniforms, and left the webbing and other gear in plain green and earth tones. In my attempt at Multicam, I used the following paint recipe: 

Base: Vallejo 819 Iraqi Sand

Large spots: Vallejo 988 Khaki

Small Spots: Vallejo 875 Beige Brown and Vallejo 893 US Dark Green mixed with AK 3024 Light Green

Squiggles: Vallejo 918 Ivory and 822 Camouflage Black/Brown

Wash: Vallejo Mecha 521 Oiled Earth mixed with Vallejo Mecha 522 Desert Sand

The 6-man team consists of 3 standard HK 416 rifleman, a minimi machine gunner, a grenadier with a M203 under-barrel launcher, and a final rifleman with a Benelli M4 shotgun.

The sniper team consists on one member with a PGM Hecate II anti-material rifle, and the other with the HK 417 marksmen rifle. I've attempted to camouflage both guns according to real world examples.

Next up are members of the Malian armed forces. I couldn't find any African figures with the appropriate equipment mix I wanted, so I opted to use Eureka Afghan National Police, along with an insurgent leader from JJG. This resulted in a few figures with facial hair, bit I'm hoping it doesn't look too out of place. 

There are quite a few different camouflage patterns in use in Mali, but I opted for Centre Europe Woodland and a light DPM, which I have seen deployed together in photos.

Woodland:

Vallejo 884 Stone Grey, 893 US Army Green, 871 Leather Brown, 950 Black washed with Vallejo Mecha 521 Oiled Earth mixed with 522 Desert Sand

DPM:

Vallejo 971 Green Grey, 896 Extra Dark Green, 822 Camouflage Black/Brown washed with Secret Weapon Green Black

While I am considering adding a Malian BRDM-2 in the future, this will effectively close out my forces for this side and I'll be focusing on more insurgents moving forward.

Sahel Conflicts: Last Shops and Final Grand Marché District

The Grand Marché (Big Market) for my tabletop is now complete with the addition of the last two buildings: a restaurant and an apartment building with shops on the lower level. 

The Buffalo Grill started out as a small Roman shop from Sarissa.  This was textured and modified with various plastic elements (some scratch built, some O scale elements from San Juan Details) and a table set from 4Ground to try and give it a more modern African flavor. I left one door on the back of the building as an entrance to the residence above. One thing I would recommend with this kit is minimizing the use of the roof/awning card elements, as they are rather flimsy and won't hold up well. 

The apartment building also began life as another Roman building from Sarissa. I opted to go with a flat roof to further differentiate it from the similar restaurant building, and also painted the window lattice black to help hide it.  The back doors were covered up, and a entrance built from one of the lower shops (in blue). 

In the original kit, the shop entrances are fully open, but I have scratch built roller doors (partially hidden by the awnings) and shopfronts for the butcher and baker.  As with the restaurant, these are based off of real businesses in Mali.

Rather than a candlestick maker, the third shop sells and services mopeds/scooters.  I didn't build this from a real prototype, but instead used advertising for a Chinese brand that seems common in western Africa.  I couldn't find modern scooters to populate the sidewalk, but Miniature Building Authority has a vintage version that I thought could get the job done.

So here is my final Grand Marché, as inspired by the one in Bamako, Mali. Obviously it isn't to the same scale or chaos as the original, but it still take up approximately 0.5m x0.5m of table space and makes a great spot to ambush patrols. 

Part of Bamako's Grand Marché for reference:

Source: https://landportal.org/pt/node/92669

As with my previous shop builds, I'm including the signage (along with some others I collected) for personal use. If the owners of any of these establishments would like their signs removed, please contact me and I would be happy to do so.