Bring me the head of Diego Garcia...and the Mayor of Addu Atoll too!

[Cap Mandrake]

[font="Courier New"]Lord Admiral Sprior
His High Holiness
CinC, ABDA, India, China, Diego Garcia, Addu Atoll and the Maldives

Temuloh is a good position but I have a feeling the Japs coming down the West coast toward Malacca are going to flank you. You might be able to hold them at Malacca but I think it is a clear hex. The trick is to evacuate on the day BEFORE the big Jap attack.

Please feel free to contact me if you are in need of further advice.

Admiral of the Fleet Mandrake
CinC Pacific
Sire of Man o' War
Immediate Past President Aru Island Homeowners Association
Memeber Toastmasters International[/font]

[Cap Mandrake]

***********January 6, 1942**********

Kavieng, Rabaul, Shortlands and Lunga are in Jap hands, falling in that order. One doesn't need to be a codebreaker to see a pattern.

I am going to try to fight for Noumea. Already ashore are two field aritllery regiments, a USN base force, 9 PBY's and a company of Free French whose expertise seems to be in cognac tasting. A Bn. of Kiwis are on their way from Fiji as are a USMC Regt. just pulling out of San Diego and one US Army Regt. south of Pearl.

Noumea is a level 2 airfield. A squadron of P-39's will arrive in 3 days in crates. A squadron of P-40B's and one of Marine SBD's are on their way.

Akagi is apparently sunk. Kaga is at Menado. Two Jap carriers were seen in the Torres Strait about 3 d ago but have now disappeared. They may have turned back into the Coral Sea. That leaves a minimum of two and as many as four Jap fleet carriers to support an attack on Noumea or Port Moresby. Enterprise is shorn of it's planes (although the Japs probably dont know this) and Lexington is sunk. Yorktown is refueling off Sydney. Wasp just picked up escorts at Pearl.

[Cap Mandrake]

**********Aboard RNN Minelayer Krakatau, East of Java [:'(], January 6, 1942*********



Ships Laundry Officer, Lt. Van Meter: <annoyingly enthusiastic> Well, that was invigorating! Nothing like a dozen Jap torpedo bombers to get the juices flowing. I figure they can't hurt us with an auspicious name like Krakatau.

<half a dozen other junior officers look at him in disbelief>

Annoyed Junior Officer: Shut up Van Meter, you retard.

[Chickenboy]

Yeah. Silly RNN. They ought to limit their volcano-named ship classes to AE and AKE ammunition tenders. [8|]

[sprior]

Admiral of the Fleet Mandrake
CinC Pacific
Sire of Man o' War
Immediate Past President Aru Island Homeowners Association
Memeber Toastmasters International

My granny knows how to suck eggs too.

Lord Admiral Sprior
His High Holiness
CinC, ABDA, India, China, Diego Garcia, Addu Atoll and the Maldives

[Mynok]

[:D] So says the English fox......

[sprior]

The bi-planes to their job again:
Allied aircraft
Swordfish I x 5
The stringbags do their job again.

Allied aircraft losses
Swordfish I: 3 damaged

Japanese Ships
xAK Syoto Maru
xAK Nanko Maru, Torpedo hits 1, on fire, heavy damage

Japanese ground losses:
20 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled
Non Combat: 1 destroyed, 2 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled

[Cap Mandrake]

Aj caramba! Jap carriers off Lord Howe Island. Lord Howe is going to be seriously ticked.

They find a tanker convoy with the long-legged 14kt variety. Uggh. Even worse, Yorktown has deferred porting at Sydney to maintain secrecy and has instead made rendezvous with her fleet oilers about 160 mi ESE of Sydney. Yorktown could easily run for Melbourne if she had enough fuel but I am afraid she will stop to refuel from the cruisers and be caught from behind by the Jap carriers which are reported headed SW. I am not sure if the Japs know she is there but I suspect the will deduce it from SBD sightings of Jap subs off Sydney. Nor is there time to reuel at sea. The only solution I could see was to fly off her aircraft to Sydney and send her to port there. This could be ugly.

To the east, an AK convoy will head for NZ. There are also a number of troop convoys trying to make it to Noumea. Wasp is too far to the East to help. Enterprise is near Perth without her air complement.



* Edited because I wasn't sure what the past tense of rendezvous was [;)]

[Cap Mandrake]

[font="Courier New"]Lord Admiral Sprior
His High Holiness
CinC, ABDA, India, China, Diego Garcia, Addu Atoll and the Maldives


Sir;

Thank you for your kind reply. Considering that the entire continent of Australia doesn't have a true fighter plane other than a few USN loaners, I suggest you temper your comments if you want shiney new USAAF toys. I have already shipped our top-of-the-line P-39, but the order can be rescinded.


Warmly;


Admiral of the Fleet Mandrake
CinC Pacific
Sire of Man o' War
Immediate Past President Aru Island Homeowners Association
Member Toastmasters International [/font]

[sprior]

Admiral of the Fleet Mandrake
CinC Pacific
Sire of Man o' War
Immediate Past President Aru Island Homeowners Association
Member Toastmasters International

And for that we thank you most profusely and promise to supply you with all the tea you drink.

Lord Admiral Sprior
His High Holiness
CinC, ABDA, India, China, Diego Garcia, Addu Atoll and the Maldives

[Cap Mandrake]

[font="Courier New"]
Lord Admiral Sprior
His High Holiness
CinC, ABDA, India, China, Diego Garcia, Addu Atoll and the Maldives
Editor in Chief, Cocos Island Gazetteer and Farmers' Almanac


My Dearest Admiral Sprior;

Your Lend-Lease proposal is splendid. We send you P-39's* and you send us tea. Please send the calming variety. The whole staff here loves the green tea. We have all been trying to lose weight here. Sadly, even those comely young ladies who lean over the big map table to move the wooden ships around have developed cottage cheese thighs. Are things as bad at your headquarters? As they say, "war is Hell".

There is also the matter of Admiral Hart and his staff who have just been evacuated from Manila by way of Borneo. they are tentatively assigned to the future SouthPAC but Noumea seems a bit dicey right now. Do you have a hostel or some tents they could stay in near Auckland for a bit? If possible, no slit latrines please as Admiral Hart is a bit of a clean freak.



Admiral of the Fleet Mandrake
CinC Pacific
Certified Lamaze Trainer
Immediate Past President Aru Island Homeowners Association
Member Toastmasters International


* Note: Neither the US Government nor the Bell Aircraft Company warrant the use of the P-39 above 14,000 ft. Still, they are a damn sight better than those flying coffin Wirraways you guys have.[/font]

[sprior]

We've taken a bit od a spanking the last couple of days. Updates to follow...

[Cap Mandrake]

I'm not sure "spanking" quite does it justice.

The situation on Jan. 9 is shown above in #288

As planned, Saratoga (not Yorktown as I said) flew off her planes and a squadron of Marine Brewsters which she had transported to Oz. The Saratoga TF was left intact and ordered to Sydney to refuel.

The KB (4 carriers, Hyryu, Soryu, Shokaku, Zuikaku) showed up about 160 SE of Sydney. They attacked and sank a small RAN coastal ASW force and bombed the port at Sydney, putting 4 bombs on Saratoga and damaging half a dozen ships in port. Despite beign in range, not a single SBD or TBD launched. About 75% of the F4F's and Brewsters were on CAP. The Brewsters faired poorly but perhaps 2 dozen Jap planes were lost.

Jan. 10: Two large USN and RAN crusier forces were formed in the hope they might intercept the Japs at night. It was not to be. Saratoga, still able to make 26 kts., made a run toward Melbourne but the Japs anticipated this and caught her, also sinking 2 DD's. More port raids were made, hitting USS San Francisco. Again no launch of USN planes from Sydney.

Jan 11: More port raids.



Total losses (ca):

Allies:

Saratoga
2 x DD
1 x PG
2 x PC
3 x AMC
3 x AK
15 Bresters
10 F4F
130,000 fuel lost at Sydney

Japs:

20-30 carrier planes.

Concurrent with this, a well-timed invasion of PM just started and there isn't a damn thing to do about it.
Emergency convoys to Noumea are almost done uloading. Noumea now has Airfield engineers, 2 Art Bn's and a Bn of Kiwis.

[Cap Mandrake]

What are the learnings?

1) Australia is VERY vulnerable at the start in AE (not a single fighter)

2) It is very easy for the Japs to get into the Coral Sea at this stage of the game. Just now, my first AVP arrived in the area, setting up shop in NW New Caledonia.

3) There aren't enough long range search aircraft at this time (particualry after destruction to PBY's in the Pearl harbor raid) to guard the Pearl to Pago Pago axis and Pago Pago to Oz

4) Using Saratoga to get some fighters to Oz seemed like a good idea. If I had been ONE DAY earlier, she would have escaped.

5) The Japs are ina good mood again as they have forgetten about the loss of Akagi and Ryujo (Zuiho) [:)]

[sprior]

The Andrew snuck into Merak again. Another transport TF goes glug glug. Snorkers for brekkers. Good-O.

[witpqs]

B-17D's are a most useful search asset for a long time in AE. Their skill level stinks, so you gotta train 'em in addition to using them. When you withdraw squadrons, make sure you say 'No' to the PP's and then 'Yes' to planes and pilots to the pools. It's easy to lose the valuable airframes by clicking wrong! [:(]

Also, you will find that if you let the fatigue level get too high on your Catalinas they will have ops losses that exceed your replacements. Treat 'em with care!

There are two groups of B-18's that upgrade to LB-30's. One is in PH, the other in Alaska. You really don't get enough LB-30's to run both for a long time, considering ops losses and all. At least for the PH based squadron, get them training on search as hard as possible using the B-18's (so as not to risk the LB-30's to training losses). Add extra pilots so they have well-trained spares when deployed. When you get them up to a high level of search skill, you will have a 'first team' for long range search when and where you need it (land based though).

You can not pull out any Dutch search groups, so you'll need to train up all the Hudsons for NZ, Aus, and UK too.

[Cap Mandrake]

ORIGINAL: witpqs

B-17D's are a most useful search asset for a long time in AE. Their skill level stinks, so you gotta train 'em in addition to using them. When you withdraw squadrons, make sure you say 'No' to the PP's and then 'Yes' to planes and pilots to the pools. It's easy to lose the valuable airframes by clicking wrong! [:(]

Also, you will find that if you let the fatigue level get too high on your Catalinas they will have ops losses that exceed your replacements. Treat 'em with care!

There are two groups of B-18's that upgrade to LB-30's. One is in PH, the other in Alaska. You really don't get enough LB-30's to run both for a long time, considering ops losses and all. At least for the PH based squadron, get them training on search as hard as possible using the B-18's (so as not to risk the LB-30's to training losses). Add extra pilots so they have well-trained spares when deployed. When you get them up to a high level of search skill, you will have a 'first team' for long range search when and where you need it (land based though).

You can not pull out any Dutch search groups, so you'll need to train up all the Hudsons for NZ, Aus, and UK too.

Yes...very good suggestions...brilliant I dare say. I dare say it is brilliant as I have instituted several of your suggestions myself and it is thusly brilliant.

I have one squadron of LB-30's flying short range ASW at Pearl (there arent enough for the other squadron yet). Most of the PBY's are posted in the Midway-Palmyra-Canton Is arc to prevent a jap carrier raid into the transport stream headed South. I do also have some B-18's fyling recon at Midway

I just was able to get aviation engineers and an AVP to Noumea (it is only January 11).

What the Japs intercepted was literally the first Australia bound convoy from the US.

B-17E's cant really be used yet in Oz as they cant reach there by air save pit stops at crappy level 2 airfields.

[Cap Mandrake]

ORIGINAL: sprior

The Andrew snuck into Merak again. Another transport TF goes glug glug. Snorkers for brekkers. Good-O.

I just LOVE what you have with the combat screen frame..sort of a Wild Sumatran Rose. Splenid!

[sprior]

We thought it would look good above the mantle

[Cap Mandrake]

Look at the composition of the unit that went glub glub off Merak.

Night Time Surface Combat, near Merak at 48,97, Range 8,000 Yards

Japanese Ships
xAP Brazil Maru, Shell hits 8, Torpedo hits 3, and is sunk
xAP Koan Maru, Shell hits 22, and is sunk
xAP Huso Maru, Shell hits 9, Torpedo hits 1, and is sunk
SC CHa-5, Shell hits 1, and is sunk
SC CHa-17, Shell hits 2, and is sunk
SC CHa-20, Shell hits 1, and is sunk

Allied Ships
CA Exeter
CL Enterprise
CL Dragon
CL Durban
CL Dauntless
CL Ceres
CL Glasgow
CL Caledon

Japanese ground losses:
485 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled
Non Combat: 9 destroyed, 66 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled
Guns lost 33 (7 destroyed, 26 disabled)

This could be an artillery unit or a AAA unit, but what would make the most sense would be a CD gun unit.

Well done sir!