Taming the Bear - Rader (J) vs. jzanes (A). A jzanes-free zone.

[rader]

I think he's also trying to breakout of the Vladivostock pocket into Manchuria (see map). We are moving units to counter this, but are fairly short in the area. While units are railing in, I've only managed to scrape together 500 AV or so for the next few turns until more help arrives. It is a swamp across a river, but he might have as much as 3000AV trying to break out. Not sure if we can hold the line. It's the Falaise pocket, Siberian-style.

[rader]

[rader]

I'm also trying to figure out what his response is going to be on other fronts. With much of the Southern army busy up North, will he take this opportunity to attack the empire? If so, where? Or will he put all his effort into helping the Ruskies? The possibility that he might strike means that I'm compelled to keep a sizable portion of my airforce and fleet reserved along likely attack vectors, rather than using them for offensive operations.

SigInt picked up "heavy radio transmissions" at Perth the last two days in a row. I wonder if he's assembling an invasion force there? Not enough to act on, but I might try to organize an Emily air overflight recon.

[rader]

June 1, 1942.

The swamp battle rages on. The Japanese were nearly forced from the hex on the last turn. 200+ allied bombers continue to wreak untold devastation every turn on the tired defenders. Japanese bombers respond in kind, but are far less numerous.

The last attack in the first turn of the 2-turn cycle came off at 1:2 by a *single point of AV*!! This single point might turn the entire campaign, because it prevented a follow-up attack the next turn, and allowed time for 2 fresh divisions to link up from Khabarovsk and reinforce the beleagered Japanese. Now there should be little danger of the swamp hex falling, and with the Khabarovsk airbase finally operational, we can start to contest the daily bombing.

Meanwhile, the first of the long-anticipated B-17 attacks on the home islands came off against Nagoya. It was intercepted by a small group of Nicks (I've spread out small divided interceptors around the major Japanese cities). They reduced the damage a bit, but the B-17s still torched a few a/c factories. Meanwhile, the Russian heavies concentrated on Harbin and managed to destroy 17 Mabel factories. Good thing I have a large pool of those in reserve (in fact, it wasn't even producing!). Once it's completely damaged, I'll probably convert it to something else. [;)]

[rader]

The fierce air battles continue, with the Russian bombers concentrating on Japanese ground troops and the Japanese bombers concentrating on Russian airfields. Severe thunderstorms prevent many sorties from flying, but this barely mitigates the titanic daily slugfest.

[rader]

In Mongolia, it's a battle of maneuver. Russian and Mongolian cavalry and light armoured units out of Ulan Bator advance and liberate a town along the road to China. Three Japanese divisions spar with their Russian counterparts in Eastern Mondolia near the Chinese/Manchurian border.

[rader]

June 3, 1942.

The B-17s raid a couple of Japanese cities again, torching a few a/c factories. Nicks dutifully intercepted, but only managed to damage a few of the beasts. Losing a/c factories is annoying for sure, but in a perverse way losing factories in Japan to bombing is better than losing oil in the DEI... you don't have to transport the supply to repair them! We traced back the attack vector of the bombers, and estimate that they originated in Voroshilovgrad. This will be the prime Japanese target for next turn.

The Russian heavies levelled Changchun this turn, torching 15 HI. We're going to have to defend our factories better.

He only lobbed over a few "reconnaissance shells" this turn in the swamp hex. The Japanese now have 4500AV in the hex compared to 1700 Russian. The Japanese have indeed secured the swamp, and soon it will be time for the Japanese to strike back. Meanwhile, the Russian medium bombers switched over to attacking a Japanese airfield in Manchuria. The did moderate damage, and the a/c are being diverted to a backup airfield this turn for continued operations.

In return, the Japanese focused on the main Russian airfield this turn (we traced back the vector from last turn to Spassk-Dalny). Two Japanese airfields concentrated their efforts here, and wreaked considerable havoc on the Russian medium bombers (see air losses). Also in the air, a Russian sweep was intercepted by Zeros, and this along with the Oscar escorts over the airfield sliced through his MIG-3s. I was kind of concerned about the performance of that particular plane (397 Mph, armor, a decent gun), but this turn the 1-15s & I-16s made it look bad.

[rader]

Meanwhile, the Japanese High Command has just learned that a few days earlier on the other side of the world, the battle around Kharkov has culminated in an enormous defeat of Soviet forces. Soviet casualties have been estimated at over 200,000, in addition to 700 tanks and 3,300 guns. The German High Command has revealed to us that they plan to drive East towards the Volga and the Caucasus this summer, and talks have already begun on co-ordinating Axis global strategy. We are confident that Axis forces emerge triumphant in this struggle! This winter, the Fuhrer will call the Japanese ambassador to discuss long-term postwar German/Japanese zones of occupation in Russia. He has even mentioned the prospect of visiting Tokyo personally!

[rader]

Thanks for point this out! I was using them heavily, but I'll drop most of the back to garrison duty and let the IJA do most of the fighting.

ORIGINAL: Smeulders

I wasn't clear enough, I am talking about the units made up off Chinese troops, so anything with IMA, Chinese or Mongolian squads. These squads have a replacement rate of "1", not enough to replace combat losses.

I do think that there are decent replacement rates for guns for the Russians, only AFV should suffer.

[Q-Ball]

This will be interesting!

Normally using Manchukuo troops to garrison Chinese Bases would be gamey, but I think it's OK in this case, since you freed them up by waking the Bear. Using Manchukuo units will free up at least another Division from China, and you probably need every infantry and tank unit you can lay your hands on for this expedition!

The good news is that you can rely on the IJN to defend the perimeter for now, so you shouldn't need many boots out in the Pacific

The one thing that would concern me is that the Allies control Darwin. Build up Lae/Nadzab area to keep the Torres Strait closed to Allied shipping.

[rader]

ORIGINAL: Q-Ball

This will be interesting!

Normally using Manchukuo troops to garrison Chinese Bases would be gamey, but I think it's OK in this case, since you freed them up by waking the Bear. Using Manchukuo units will free up at least another Division from China, and you probably need every infantry and tank unit you can lay your hands on for this expedition!

No, I just mean garrisons in Manchukuo itself. All together, you need hundreds of AV in Harbin, Changchun, Port Arthur, Mukden, and various other places. Can't send them to China proper. That would be against the HR.

[rader]

ORIGINAL: Q-Ball

The good news is that you can rely on the IJN to defend the perimeter for now, so you shouldn't need many boots out in the Pacific

The one thing that would concern me is that the Allies control Darwin. Build up Lae/Nadzab area to keep the Torres Strait closed to Allied shipping.

This is exactly it. I figure I have a couple of months before he's really ready to come at me. During that time, I have garrisoned places as best as I can and have most of the IJNAF and IJN around guarding key locations. The KB will remain hidden for the duration, waiting to pounce on any allied moves. Almost all Nettie units, many zeroes and some army fighters and bombers are also spread around the perimeter.

I'm not sure I want to bother with Darwin itself, but I'm pounding it every day from the air and its airfield has never been operational. In fact, he only has the single unit there. I know he might try to come through there at some point, but I simply don't want to spend the ground forces to secure and hold it.

However, I avidly read your AAR, and I am keenly aware of the dangers it poses. I am putting heavy emphasis on the PM area, Timor, and the West Side of Sumatra. I have built up key interlocking airbases with air HQs, and wherever possible in forrest/jungle-rough hexes for the 3x defensive bonus. Most forts in these key areas are 4+ and climbing. Let's see if I can get some lvl 9 forts [:D].

I also have 2 divisions in reserve stacked with fast transport groups (I just mean ~18 kt APs) for reaction. However, if he came with everything while most of the army is in Russia, he might make some progress. The best I can do it guarantee it will be slow and costly.

I've been detecting a lot of radio transmissions from Perth lately. I'm going to send the AV Akitsushima to Port Heland and set up a few Emily recons of the port (handpicked the pilots for the mission). If I feel lucky, I might even try a night port attack with the flying boats!

[lolz]

excellent aar!
japanese and soviet battles are always good.

[rader]

June 5, 1942: The Air Battle of Vladivostock

The Allied Heavies pounded on Sapparo (B-17s), Harbin (Russians), and Mukden (Russians), and although some Japanese fighters took to the skies, most of the bombers made it through.

Meanwhile, for the main event, all available Japanese aircraft pounded the main Russian airbase. The largest air battle in the Far East to date took place, with a furball in the skies and many planes downed on both sides. Many Japanese bombers made it through to inflict serious damage on the airfield, and destroy tons of aircraft on the ground (see air losses). Over 450 aircraft were lost today. I'm not sure either side can maintain this rate of loss!

[rader]

Just did some quick calculations, and based on current loss estimates (800 total a/c lost), the Russians still have around 600 fighters left (from ~1000 at start), and around 600 bombers left (from ~800 at start). They're still pretty strong, but we're grinding them down nicely. That's pretty good work for two weeks of combat.

By comparison, I estimate the Japanese have around 1200 total aircraft in the theater (around the same as the Russians currently have), and have lost around 500 so far.

At this rate, we should win air superiority eventually (especially since the Japanese losses will be easier to replace), but I just hope the Japanese air force isn't worn to a nub by the time the allies come for us [:'(].

[rader]

June 6-7 are unusually quiet, as thunderstorms cancel most major air operations.

June 9, 1942.

The Japanese raid Blagovychechensk, but the bombers had already relocated. I did find some fighters, and this resulted in soem more air battles. I seem to be chasing him around the airfields. Each turn he relocates to a new one. Each turn I pick one of those possibilities to bomb. Sometimes I get lucky. Sometimes I crater an empty airfield. We are wearing him down though (see air losses).

I also decided to bring in 2 groups of Betties from the South to accelerate the pace of operations. Hopefully this won't strip the perimeter too much (or maybe this will spurn him into early action, which could be a good thing?).

The Emily air recon of Perth flew today. No ships spotted in harbour, but we did find 26(!) LCUs there. I bet the lack of ships is FOW... We're going to try again soon.

We also decided to try our luck at pushing the Russians out of the swamp hex between Khabarovsk and Birdobidzhan. It was a bit ugly:

Japanese Deliberate attack

Attacking force 127145 troops, 1221 guns, 1047 vehicles, Assault Value = 4405

Defending force 40325 troops, 928 guns, 1314 vehicles, Assault Value = 1703

Japanese adjusted assault: 2081

Allied adjusted defense: 4393

Japanese assault odds: 1 to 2

Combat modifiers
Defender: terrain(+)
Attacker:

Japanese ground losses:
10247 casualties reported
Squads: 40 destroyed, 764 disabled
Non Combat: 18 destroyed, 686 disabled
Engineers: 3 destroyed, 97 disabled
Guns lost 9 (0 destroyed, 9 disabled)
Vehicles lost 85 (4 destroyed, 81 disabled)


Allied ground losses:
1160 casualties reported
Squads: 21 destroyed, 248 disabled
Non Combat: 26 destroyed, 433 disabled
Engineers: 1 destroyed, 25 disabled
Guns lost 29 (1 destroyed, 28 disabled)
Vehicles lost 377 (30 destroyed, 347 disabled)


Assaulting units:
29th Division
25th Division
12th Division
28th Division
1st Division
27th Electric Engineer Regiment
6th Tank Regiment
8th Division
71st Engineer Regiment
14th Tank Regiment
1st Tank Regiment
57th Division
9th Division
7th Tank Regiment
4th Garrison Unit
5th Tank Regiment
24th Division
10th Tank Regiment
5th Army
3rd Hvy.Artillery Regiment
2nd Hvy.Artillery Regiment
9th Medium Field Artillery Regiment
20th Army
4th Medium Field Artillery Regiment
Tonei Hvy Gun Regiment

Defending units:
422nd Rifle Division
3rd Ussurii Tank Brigade
205th Rifle Division
258th NKVD Regiment
171st Tank Brigade
34th Rifle Division
8th Cavalry Division
203rd Tank Brigade
1121st Cannon Regiment
1194th BM Howitzer Regiment
1137th Howitzer Regiment
190th/398th PVO AA Battalion
1123rd Cannon Regiment
424th Hvy Howitzer Regiment
1131st Hvy Howitzer Regiment
145th Howitzer Regiment
52nd Cannon Regiment
187th Cannon Regiment
362nd/367th OM Gun Battalion
1128th Howitzer Regiment
1130th Howitzer Regiment

[ADB123]

Are you invading any of the isolated Soviet bases to the northeast? I would expect that the Allied player would use them to ship 4Es to Siberia.

[rader]

ORIGINAL: ADB123

Are you invading any of the isolated Soviet bases to the northeast? I would expect that the Allied player would use them to ship 4Es to Siberia.

Good question. I did take all the empty isoldated ones by paradrop. I am working up an invasion of Petropavlovsk to cut off this route. I am anxious to cut off this air rebase route. Can the allies ship a/c on roads? If so, I expect some Allied planes to arrive through China also.

[ADB123]

ORIGINAL: rader

ORIGINAL: ADB123

Are you invading any of the isolated Soviet bases to the northeast? I would expect that the Allied player would use them to ship 4Es to Siberia.

Good question. I did take all the empty isoldated ones by paradrop. I am working up an invasion of Petropavlovsk to cut off this route. I am anxious to cut off this air rebase route. Can the allies ship a/c on roads? If so, I expect some Allied planes to arrive through China also.

Planes can be sent by railroad, but not by regular road. I don't think that there are any railroads that connect China and the Soviet Union. There are plenty of Soviet bases that are close enough to Chinese bases to fly planes, so your opponent has that option.

Good luck

[seydlitz_slith]

Be aware that you are engaged with local forces on your salient. He still has a lot of troops at Vladivostok to use and if he is smart he will drive due north through Rashin and cut the southern leg of your rail supply. He can then move NNW and cut your other major rail line. This may not happen depending on what he has moved, but in my game I found that the Soviets have far more experienced units than anticipated. I suggest that you keep a couple of divisions off the front line as a reserve that can move where needed. You will most likely need them at some point.