Invasion Houston

[Subdude]

You might have seen this story about how the secret maps for the Russian invasion of Manchester UK were published. Evidently having too much time on my hands today, this got me to thinking.

Suppose you were planning a ground (or sea)-based invasion of Houston. What would be the best strategy? What route(s) would you take? What would be your targets?

My first thought was to take the city from the west (the Katy front) to corner the defenders against the bay.

[august948]

You might have seen this story about how the secret maps for the Russian invasion of Manchester UK were published. Evidently having too much time on my hands today, this got me to thinking.

Suppose you were planning a ground (or sea)-based invasion of Houston. What would be the best strategy? What route(s) would you take? What would be your targets?

My first thought was to take the city from the west (the Katy front) to corner the defenders against the bay.

There are no significant defenders. Best thing for the mayor to do is declare Houston an open city.

Come in from the Gulf. Secure the ports. Take Ellington Field, IAH, and Hobby. Secure any other smaller airports capable of landing C130's.

Then set up positions outside the city along 59S, 290, 45N and 10W and wait for the counter-attack from III corp out of Fort Hood.

[spiderroller]

You might have seen this story about how the secret maps for the Russian invasion of Manchester UK were published. Evidently having too much time on my hands today, this got me to thinking.

Suppose you were planning a ground (or sea)-based invasion of Houston. What would be the best strategy? What route(s) would you take? What would be your targets?

My first thought was to take the city from the west (the Katy front) to corner the defenders against the bay.

Would have to be both land and sea. A coordinated invasion of Galveston by sea, along with air and ground invasion into Houston.

Simultaneously:

Invade Galveston by sea and control the beachfront and the bay (you will eventually have to defend it from the entire U.S. Military)

Take over all airports and airfields (Sugarland, Ellington, IAH, Hobby, etc.)

Take over Beltway 8 in its entirety, primarily East, West and North. Essentially circle the city.

Separate air/ground invasion of Katy.

Allow all citizens access to flee down 59 South... and only down 59 South... one-way ticket out... 1/3 of the population will continue until they're out of the Country.

Unless you have a force as large as say, Germany in WWII.... no way you wouldn't be decimated in the end.

[august948]

Allow all citizens access to flee down 59 South... and only down 59 South... one-way ticket out... 1/3 of the population will continue until they're out of the Country.

Unless you have a force as large as say, Germany in WWII.... no way you wouldn't be decimated in the end.

Good idea forcing the people out, but I'd push them down 10, 290, and 45 to delay the arrival of troops from Ft Hood.

Realistically, though, for there to be any chance of success an invasion of Texas would have to concentrate on the Naval installations at Corpus Christi and the Army and Air Force bases in San Antonio, Killeen, and Abilene. Houston would just get a garrison force to control the port, airfields and refineries.

[Native Son]

you know they are remaking "Red Dawn"..

spider, are you writing the script?

[spiderroller]

you know they are remaking "Red Dawn"..

spider, are you writing the script?

Yes. But instead of the Wolverines, I'm making them the Oilers. And we'll be invaded by the Mexicans, not the Cubans and Russians.

[august948]

Yes. But instead of the Wolverines, I'm making them the Oilers. And we'll be invaded by the Mexicans, not the Cubans and Russians.

Oh...I thought we were talking invasion by a serious force here. If it's Mexico we can all just get a cooler of beer and some deer rifles. No need to involve the US military, we can handle it ourselves.

[Highway6]

What would be the point of invading Houston in the classical sense, whats the end game?

They couldn't possibly hope to contain but a fraction of the residents and really how valuable would that be.. it would just turn into some sort of swat stand-off with bigger players on both sides. And August is right.. it wouldnt be but a few hours once the word got out that the cavalry arrives from Ft. Hood and the air reconnassaince out of Randolf or Lackland would be here even before then to assess the situation.

More likely, it would be some sort of terrorist situation, where they invade a high value target in order to get concessions from the gvt or just to cause mayhem. Seems the only target worth invading would be the refineries of Baytown and Pasadena etc. Take out or threaten to take out a huge chunk of the nation's domestic refining capability.

So yah, seems Invasion via the Port of Houston would be the way to go. Depending on the size of the invading force, requisition several freighters and they could launch a coorindated vehicle assault literally from the front yard of their target before they are spotted.

I know the Port is supposed to have fairly advanced security, but this is land-based right? Fences, guard stations, perimeter cameras, etc. Do they, or is their a coast guard presense in the Ship channel that essentially greets ships as they enter to assess any security concerns?

IF not.. seems thats the way to invade Houston - come up the ship channel and make a bee-line to surround, take over, or destroy all the refineries they can.

The fastest responding US ground force would come from the north or west. So they should probably take out the 225/610 interchange as well as the beltway 8 bridge over the ship channel and the 45/8 interchange. Assuming they had tanks stored on those inbound freighters, Seek to control the 12 mile stretch of 225 from 610 to 146 and 146 from 225 to Baytown to access the bulk of the refineries. Controlling the 146 bridge is essentially the door to the ship channel, so I guess they could try to hold that to prevent Marine or Seal sea-access into the port.. but the Air Force would see that and take out that bridge to split their force and allow a US sea counter-assault.

Also, forgot... The National Guard and Texas State Guard have a presence at Ellington as well as an armory in Baytown. So they should probably include some sort of assault helicopters on their freighters to take out those early on.

Actually.. none of this would work. In-bound containers and ships are checked for dirty or nuclear bombs, right, otherwise terrorists would have loaded up a freighter and set it off in the middle of the ship channel by now. Hopefully the Trojan Horse Cargo Ship invasion has already been thought up and measures taken by now to prevent any sea-attack at the port.

[spiderroller]

Yea. That was a funny.

But.. in all seriousness... it would have to be something equivalent to the Germans or Russians... otherwise... they'd be sitting ducks here with their backs against the Gulf Coast as our entire naval force invaded from the South and our land forces came from all directions. They'd have to have supreme air authority - i.e. they'd have to be able to defeat our Air Force.

On the other hand... because we always think conventional.... if it were simply a ground invasion of a few billion muslims or chinese... dropped by the tens of thousands every few hours ..... we'd have a problem.

I've always said... thank God we have 2 oceans on each side of us... because... I don't think we could defend ourselves on our own soil in a non-conventional war. We would run out of people and we couldn't carpet bomb our own cities and towns. Picture a Vietnam, Iraq or Afghanistan conflict on our own soil.

[JLWM8609]

Well, as with any invasion of Houston, you have to start with the first step of "Take 610 and exit at. . .". Only then you can go onward with your invasion plans.

[TheNiche]

You might have seen this story about how the secret maps for the Russian invasion of Manchester UK were published. Evidently having too much time on my hands today, this got me to thinking.

Suppose you were planning a ground (or sea)-based invasion of Houston. What would be the best strategy? What route(s) would you take? What would be your targets?

My first thought was to take the city from the west (the Katy front) to corner the defenders against the bay.

If it were the Russians, then their strategy would definitely require that Houston's petrochemical assets be captured or destroyed early on. The problem for the Russians is that we'd probably sabotage our own infrastructure before the Russians were able to take it; we'd do this because we would know that if the Russians did manage to capture the infrastructure successfully and we mounted a counterattack, then they'd sabotage the infrastructure on their way out...which means that we either have to initially defend it or we have to initially destroy it...because otherwise it gets used against us for an indeterminant period of time.

Without our petrochemical assets, Houston is of questionable strategic value. The most damaging thing they could do (if they bothered to land ground forces) would be to flush out the civilian population and then systematically burn down large swaths of the city, forcing the U.S. military to divert resources to the sustinence and evacuation of otherwise-helpless refugee populations.

Until reinforcements arrive, the Russian strategy would likely require that its armies focus on achieving the capture or destruction of key strategic objectives, without at first attempting to hold sizable land areas such as would be subject to a war of attrition. So if Houston is captured and havoc was engineered, I suspect that it'd soon be abandoned as the Russian force moved inland. I wouldn't count on an immediate counter-attack from military bases because--depending upon what stage of the war we'd be in--force levels at the bases may be reduced while soldiers are countering other invasions that are geographically-removed from Texas.

[Subdude]

If it were the Russians, then their strategy would definitely require that Houston's petrochemical assets be captured or destroyed early on. The problem for the Russians is that we'd probably sabotage our own infrastructure before the Russians were able to take it; we'd do this because we would know that if the Russians did manage to capture the infrastructure successfully and we mounted a counterattack, then they'd sabotage the infrastructure on their way out...which means that we either have to initially defend it or we have to initially destroy it...because otherwise it gets used against us for an indeterminant period of time.

Without our petrochemical assets, Houston is of questionable strategic value. The most damaging thing they could do (if they bothered to land ground forces) would be to flush out the civilian population and then systematically burn down large swaths of the city, forcing the U.S. military to divert resources to the sustinence and evacuation of otherwise-helpless refugee populations.

Until reinforcements arrive, the Russian strategy would likely require that its armies focus on achieving the capture or destruction of key strategic objectives, without at first attempting to hold sizable land areas such as would be subject to a war of attrition. So if Houston is captured and havoc was engineered, I suspect that it'd soon be abandoned as the Russian force moved inland. I wouldn't count on an immediate counter-attack from military bases because--depending upon what stage of the war we'd be in--force levels at the bases may be reduced while soldiers are countering other invasions that are geographically-removed from Texas.

I was really just trying to think through how an invasion would work, not the course of a war, but I agree that the pet-chem complex would be the primary objective, along with controlling the port, but I have a hard time seeing us sabotage the refineries. If the refineries and port were the objective, then perhaps the best primary invasion route would be from the east on land (I10), coupled with some sea support. If that were the invasion route it would be critical early on to capture and secure the bridges over the ship channel, since if they were sabotaged that would cut off easy access to the refineries. However I assume as in most invasions there would be teams ready to build quick bridge replacements.

It seems that one big weakness of invading by freeway is that a lot of freeway sections are depressed, primarily outside the loop. That would leave them vulnerable to attack from snipers from above. Because of that, in the eastern front scenario I was describing it might make sense to concentrate on securing the east side outside the loop, spreading out from the initial ship channel refinery beachhead next to try to take Hobby, Ellington, then IAH, with a goal of controlling a roughly crescent-shaped strip of territory outside 610 (roughly bounded on the west by Hardy Toll Road, 610 and Gulf Fwy.).

By this point presumably a lot of the civilian population west of the line would have fled, so it might make it easier to try to move west.

What would be the point of invading Houston in the classical sense, whats the end game?

They couldn't possibly hope to contain but a fraction of the residents and really how valuable would that be.. it would just turn into some sort of swat stand-off with bigger players on both sides. And August is right.. it wouldnt be but a few hours once the word got out that the cavalry arrives from Ft. Hood and the air reconnassaince out of Randolf or Lackland would be here even before then to assess the situation.

I don't know. For that matter what would be the point of invading Manchester, but someone thought enough of it to draw up quite detailed invasion plans, and I can certainly see more strategic value in Houston than Manchester. Just trying to have some fun with the premise here.