The First Team: Take Two!

[John 3rd]

Our Torpedo Planes fly and do well this turn...

[Q-Ball]

John has been carrying the water in terms of updating the AAR, which is fine, I'm pretty busy otherwise. The last couple weeks have been pretty routine anyway in my neck of the woods, with concentration on several overall objectives and campaigns:

India
The main objective here has been to eliminate the Allied airforces. It took awhile to build sufficient airbases. We lost ALOT of Zeros in the process, but also broke the back of RAF. John showed the graphic, they were putting up Buffalos and Mohawks, which pretty much told us the RAF was shot.

At any rate, Bombay and Karachi airfields are craters, and we have the air. The next objective: Attacks at Bombay. It will take while to drop the forts.

With the action off Karachi, we should have both bases isolated from convoys. They haven't run ships to Bombay for awhile. I suspect both bases started with massive piles, so starving them probably isn't an option.

Ceylon
We have been working on clearing Ceylon; just can't have that in our rear. I landed with almost 800 AV, which I thought was overkill, but they left a surprisingly large garrison of 2 whole Bdes. Most people say to not garrison it at all, since if your opponent controls the opposite shore, it's a lost cause anyway.

Burma
This campaign is closed. We have 2 divisions watching the river north of Lashio, with 12 depeleted Chinese/British units on the other side. We're pulling everyone else out for India.

China
We are keeping up enough of the appearance of activity to keep them on the defensive. We might try to isolate Homan. Otherwise, lately I have been working on the Chinese air force, and resources.

[Rainer79]

How much AV have you assembled to tackle Bombay?

[John 3rd]

ORIGINAL: Rainer79

How much AV have you assembled to tackle Bombay?

Once Ceylon falls and 9th Inf Div unloads I think our total will be over 5,000. We should begin the true attack upon Bombay with 7-8 Inf Div, 6-8 Heavy Artillery Regiments, and 6-8 Engineering Regiments. The Engineers and Artillery will be the key. This is roughly twice what I had when I was fighting Dan in the Forlorn Hopes AAR.

Add to this force total control of the air. Pangrim will go to Lvl 3 and we can use it to hurl another 150 bombers at the target. Figure Bombay will be hit by upwards of 250 bombers a day. Our BB Force is freshly repaired so they will add to the chaos.

Should be fairly wild-and-crazy!

[Rainer79]

*grabs popcorn*

While it is true that the combat engineers will be able to deal with the forts even at 0:1 odds I don't think it will be enough to force the final 2:1 result needed for a surrender. I wouldn't mind to be proven wrong though.

[flaggelant]

I'd say with 5000 AV and an enemy disrupted into approx 80 to 90 percent starting at 2.5K AV
(john, was it 2.5 you guys were up against in Bombay??) even the city hex shouldnt be able to
make the difference anymore.
 
and for the sake of John & Q, i wouldnt want to be wrong on this one
 
so guys, were waiting for the proof, good luck
 
 

[John 3rd]

I tend to agree with both of you. The fight will be dicey (pardon the pun) and we'll see what happens. Beyond the Aerial bombardment we can also add the 6 IJN BB. There are 3 at Trivandrum right now and the other 3 will rendezvous at Singapore within a day or two. Be nice to finally get them back into things. Flaggelant is dead-on when it comes to disruption to take the base. If we can be hitting it with 250-300 bombers a turn, bombarding with BBs every couple of turns, and attacking with 5,000 AV, we stand a chance. Who knows?!!

We do have other things happening to concern our Allied opponents:

[Cap Mandrake]

Not to state the obvious but those are two AP's. They wouldn't send in AP's to bring in supplies.

Were they inbound empty....i.e...evac convoy


or outbound empty....delivering more troops?

Of course, the converse is true if there were troops aboard when sunk.

[Nemo121]

Engineers and Artillery will be the key.

 
No, your air will be the key. You will win or lose these assaults based on your air support. With Pangim being only Level 3 you are only carrying half loads. I would wait until it hits Level 4 personally as that doubles your bombload, allows your planes to hit twice as many enemy units and reduce their base AV twice as much.
 
That's the key, reducing the non-adjusted AV so that the adjustments ( which your engineers etc, despite the hopes here, won't do much about ) don't multiply things as much.

[John 3rd]

GREAT note Nemo!  Brad--Did you catch that?  We can also fly from Bangalore since it is Sz-4.  Be nice to load all 3 AF and knock down Bombay with that combined force.

The APs were heading TOWARDS the Aden Channel AND they were carrying troops!  It immediately caught my attention.  When Westralia sank she took 413 men with her.  Unfortunately I don't know the unit.  Were they taking out a Fragment?  That certainly fits their tactics.  I have come to HATE SS evacuations! 

If we can intercept and/or Betty attack the force leaving Karachi then we might find out a bit more regarding what is happening.     

[Q-Ball]

Agree on the air, Poona is size-4, and we have been bombing round the clock from Poona. We have alot of low-morale and depleted bomber units from supressing Karachi, but they are about "fixed". We took alot of losses closing Karachi, but you do what you have to do; they lost 100s of planes there as well.

We are going to attack as soon as the last engineers get there, and the bombers are rested. We don't need to wait for Pangim, though having that built will be helpful.

As for inbound vs. outbound, that is a great question. I think it's INBOUND, as I don't beleive they feel threatened there, but we can't say for sure until sinking a ship going in a specific direction.

We need to get CV's up there pretty soon, because the next move they will make is to bring the RN CV's out of the Aden Channel. If we concentrate our CV's, we can be waiting for them.

[John 3rd]

Perfect thoughts by my view.  The 3 CVLs left Kwajalein yesterday bound for Singapore.  These with the Junyos, CVL, and 4 CVE leave you with enough firepower to sink the Royal Navy if it sails out to engage.  If you place a pair of Zero Daitai on the CVEs you might be able to practically guarantee protecting the CVs from RN attacks.

[Cap Mandrake]

Probably too late for AE but perhaps there should be some type of garrison requirement for the Japanese in regard to Indian cities. Colonial India did not universally embrace the British, but I think it would be fair to assume there would be several hundred million pissed off Indians under a Japanese occuption.

Even worse if they strayed into Pashto areas.

[Q-Ball]

ORIGINAL: Cap Mandrake

Probably too late for AE but perhaps there should be some type of garrison requirement for the Japanese in regard to Indian cities. Colonial India did not universally embrace the British, but I think it would be fair to assume there would be several hundred million pissed off Indians under a Japanese occuption.

Even worse if they strayed into Pashto areas.

I'm not an AE tester, but this has been asked. It's in there! The Japanese still have garrison requirements in China. The Japanese now have garrison requirements in Australia. And BOTH SIDES have garrison requirements in India. This makes sense, as the Brits had to keep troops there the entire war.

[Canoerebel]

Are you guys playing with the usual "No Japs in the Aden/Panama Canal channels or within four hexes of the entrances to those channels"?

[John 3rd]

We're working on the ability to enter but one has to reduce plane range to 1 and reduce speed to cruise for ships reflecting the larger hexes.

[John 3rd]

Not much happened this turn!

[John 3rd]

Our ships catch that Convoy leaving Karachi!

[Q-Ball]

As John indicated, they are pulling aircraft OUT of Karachi. I think this is important; it tells me that they don't have any plans to attack out of Karachi anytime soon.

They have 47 units in the hex, and easily kicked out a division, though we have more troops nearby around Malir. I am sure many of those units are beat-up; but why would they pull the planes?

Why wouldn't you leave the empty air units there? If they can clear the runway, they can always then fill it with planes and pilots. With the units gone, the fighters can only get back by ship.

Anyway, the good news is that they have ceded control of the air.

[Hornblower]

that is intersting...