Golden Journal No. 36:
Atlantic Marines
Scenario Preview, Part One
by Mike Bennighof, Ph.D.
April 2021

One of the things I like about designing scenario sets for the Golden Journals is the creative freedom. I figure that since most of them will be given to the Gold Club for free, and rest sold only to the Gold Club, that the audience has access to the full range of games in whatever the series might be. Normally, we try to confine the scenarios in an expansion to the parts (maps and pieces) from just one game or maybe two.

Golden Journal No. 36: Atlantic Marines is larger than the usual Golden Journal, and that gives it space for a full-sized scenario set. Its set of pieces is also enormous: 165 of them, the U.S. Marine sheet from our old Guadalcanal game. And so I could tell two stories of operations planned for the Atlantic Fleet’s Marine Brigade, but not actually executed. There are three chapters in Atlantic Marines, each with its own battle game. Let’s look at the first one.

Chapter One
Operation Bungalow 1941
On the last day of October 1941, a German submarine torpedoed and sank the American destroyer Reuben James, killing 115 American sailors. Knowing that the Republican opposition would not countenance military action against Nazi Germany, President Franklin D. Roosevelt ordered the occupation of French-ruled Martinique without a declaration of war. Roosevelt would later invoke the Monroe Doctrine as justification, since German submarines had obtained supplies at the island and landed their sick and wounded there.

The invasion, code-named Operation Bungalow, would be carried out by the 1st Marine Brigade, assisted by troops of the U.S. Army’s 1st Infantry Division. The island was thought to be well-garrisoned by troops loyal to the Vichy regime who would put up serious resistance.

Note: Roosevelt did not actually order an invasion of Martinique; he went to the Senate instead where the Republicans successfully foiled his attempt to repeal the Neutrality Act. Our scenarios are based on the American assessment of French capabilities to defend Martinique, which were wildly in excess of the island’s actual garrison and weaponry (there were no tanks on Martinique).

Scenario One
Beaches of Case-Pilote
November 1941
When President Roosevelt ordered the invasion of Martinique, the United States had not yet entered the Second World War. The U.S. Marines had conducted amphibious training, but did not yet possess the ubiquitous ramped “Higgins Boats” used in landings in Europe and the Pacific. The Marines would have to come ashore in ships’ boats provided by the invasion fleet transports and escorting warships.

Conclusion
The Marines stormed ashore from their boats, unable to bring any heavy weapons with them. It didn’t matter much; the French had numbers but far less will to fight, and by mid-morning the invaders had secured their beachhead and nearby towns, but many of the French defenders escaped to fight again.

Notes
It’s an invasion scenario, because we have to have an invasion scenario. The Marines try to storm ashore, but they just have plain old boats, not Higgins Boats, and that slows down the storming. The French aren’t all that eager to be here, but they’ve got a lot of nice slow targets puttering toward them.

Scenario Two
Into the Sea
November 1941
With the Marines coming ashore rather slowly and unable to land heavy equipment over the beaches, the French command on Martinique ordered an immediate counter-attack. The remnants of the weak battalion guarding the beach were joined by reinforcements from the nearby capital Fort-de-France to strike the Marines in the afternoon.

Conclusion
The Marines halted the French attack after it had gained only a little ground, and their beachhead was never put in jeopardy. The Marines had no short-range anti-tank weapons - the bazooka anti-tank rocket would not see its first action for another year - and fought the ancient French tanks with hand grenades and crowbars. In the hands of Marines, those proved sufficient.

Notes
The French strike back at the Marine beachhead, and they’ve got tanks! Not very good tanks, and not very many of them, and only one tank leader so they have to cluster together. But still, tanks, and the Marines have no anti-tank guns. But they’re Marines.

Scenario Three
Drop Zone Fort-de-France
November 1941
The War Department assigned the small Marine Parachute Battalion to the Martinique invasion force with the intent that the paratroopers would drop on the island’s airfield. It was known that over 100 American-made warplanes had been sent to Martinique, and these had to be neutralized as quickly as possible. But Martinique had no airfield, and so the paratroopers would land in the fields just east of the capital Fort-de-France.

Conclusion
The American parachute landing scattered badly, but French opposition proved weak and both companies had the chance to gather themselves and seek their objectives. The French suffered badly from American air attacks, and by afternoon the Para-Marines had successfully established a strong blocking position isolating Fort-de-France from any reinforcements summoned from the eastern or central portions of the island.

Notes
Okay, so we have these Marine Parachute units on the Guadalcanal sheet and we never got to use them in an airborne drop (they fought as leg infantry on the Canal). An airborne drop on Martinique’s non-existent airfield was part of the Operation Bungalow plan, so we have it for you here.

Scenario Four
Big Red One
November 1941
While the Marines occupied the French garrison’s attention, the 1st Infantry Division’s 16th Infantry Regiment came ashore at the fishing port of Le Robert on the opposite shore of Martinique. They were opposed by a handful of French policemen who protested the unauthorized unloading of men and equipment but otherwise did not interfere. It took several hours to sort out the companies and battalions and march on Fort-de-France to relieve the Marine paratroopers.

Conclusion
Superior American firepower turned back the French, despite the presence of tanks on the defenders’ side. The hastily-assembled American regiment lacked the cohesion and morale of the Marines, but provide sufficient to overcome French resistance. The road to Fort-de-France now lay open.

Notes
The Army was part of Operation Bungalow, so we have them here, too. The 1st Infantry Division has grouped all of its trained professionals into one regimental task force for this operation, and that’s bad news for the guys fighting under the sign of the angry chicken.

Aftermath
The U.S. Army forces had no combat experience, but the Marines were long-service professionals who had seen action in many brushfire wars around the globe. The French likewise had little experience, and after putting up an initial fight the garrison swiftly crumbled. Within a week all organized resistance had been quashed and the island began to adjust to American military occupation. At home the Republican Party rallied behind Charles Lindbergh, calling Roosevelt a dictator and a war-monger, but their efforts to impeach FDR went nowhere.

Notes
The first chapter lets us pit the early-war U.S. Marines and early-war Army (from An Army at Dawn) against the French from 1940: The Fall of France, all taking place on the maps from Saipan 1944 and Marianas 1944. It’s the sort of campaign you’re not likely to see anywhere else, but it did almost actually happen. Almost.

The Golden Journal is only available to the Gold Club (that’s why we call it the Golden Journal). It’s free when we first offer it, but then it’s $9.99 afterwards. We print enough of them to handle initial demand and a few extras, but once they’re gone we won’t reprint them – there’s just no profit in a company as small as Avalanche Press keeping a $19.99 item perpetually in stock. If you want your Atlantic Marines, the time to grab it is now.

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Mike Bennighof is president of Avalanche Press and holds a doctorate in history from Emory University. A Fulbright Scholar and NASA Journalist in Space finalist, he has published zillions of books, games and articles on historical subjects. He lives in Birmingham, Alabama with his wife, three children, and his dog Leopold, who is a good dog.

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