Battle Back Bonus

This question comes from a posting on Board Game Geek. It seems there are two schools of thought on this, and I thought I'd see if there's an official ruling. Here's the scenario:

A unit declares a melee attack.
The Defender plays a First Strike, Canister, or Infantry Combat First card, allowing the original Defender to roll his melee attack first.

Can the original Attacker then play a Battle Back Bonus card after the Defender's melee roll?

Two schools of thought on this. The first is that the original attacker is attacking, and thus not battling back. The second school of thought is that the First Strike card just reverses the melee combat order, meaning that battle back is simply the second of the two melee die rolls.

"The first is that the original attacker is attacking, and thus not battling back."

We played it this way so far, because of the rules

-Battle Back (Defending unit’s Battle Back, apply hits and resolves retreats)-
the card text should refer to the "original" defender.

But i will check it, sometimes Richard has indeed other thoughts in past...

As i said, "Battle Back" refers to the passive player!

"First Strike card (and similar cards) states “battle as originally ordered”.
The combat after a first strike is not a battle back.

Richard Borg
2017-10-30