Fulkerson (J) vs Moore (A) ( no Moore )

[larryfulkerson]

And of course, hiere's the combat report:

[larryfulkerson]

I have discovered a situation I didn't know I had. There's a base near Java, Denpasar that has some air support but not nearly enough.
I need to make a mental note to get some AF dudes to D. pretty quick because I have whole squadrons that can't fly because their planes
are down for maint.

[larryfulkerson]

I had a squadron at Oosthaven that had just as many M2 Zero's as there were M3 Zero's in the pool and I upgraded the squadron's
planes and they came in crates that I have to open and take out the parts, etc. These Zero's aren't going to be ready to do any ops
either today or tonight and maybe not tomorrow depending on how fast the maint. staff is.

[larryfulkerson]

I've got some Zero's at Maladapted that volunteered to straffe the DD's to the east. So I put them on naval attack thinking that would just
about do it. And I have since changed the altitude to 100' to cause the straffing. I'll let you know how it went.

[larryfulkerson]

I've got some ships at Maladapted that are greyed out and I can't turn them into a TF. I guess that they are still tied up to the dock or
maybe floating out in the yard somewhere. Easy prey to Jim's killers..

EDIT: I'm kind of slow and didn't see it at first but there's a minefield dot in the Maladapted hex. So Jim is moving all his ships to that
hex hoping to cash in on the minefield's protection. D'oh. And I'm down to my last undamaged DMS ship at Bataan. I'll have to put an
emergency push on the request that the DMS come do this minefield first before he does Bataan.

[larryfulkerson]

TF 131 is bringing about 28K of much needed fuel to Truk. If it weren't for these refill missions Truk would have run out of fuel long ago.
And the same can be said about supplies. The front lines in the PI are soaking up supplies and there's so many bases that are just
about out of everything that it's going to take at least until June before every base has "enough" to last a while. I'm probably dreaming
when I think about having enough to go around that everyplace is maxed out, even the hubs. But I'm thinking I can deposit dabs of fuel
and supply just about everywhere to tide them over until I can re-visit, then concentrate on the fighting lines, keeping them supplied
Maybe I have my priorities backward, lemme think about that.

EDIT: Yeah, I think maybe it'd be a good idea to make sure that the fighting positions have supply before I give much thought to taking
supplies / fuel to somewhere that's out of supplies and fuel or is about to be.

EDIT2: I just realized that I may have given you the impression that I don't have enough boats to service the front lines and the myriad
bases at the same time and I'm really not sure that I don't. Lemme look around and do some back of the envelope calculations to give
a good estimate of how much can be devoted to one task so as to leave the rest of the boats to do the other. Just off the top of my
head I'm thinking maybe I can devote maybe something like 20% to servicing the front lines so that 80% of the boats can be doing the
behind the scenes kind of work making sure everywhere has some of what it needs at least.

[larryfulkerson]

I transfered a Glen unit off the I-123 at Kwaj and I notice here it is a couple of days later and a Glen isn't coming forth to replace the lost
one. So I got to looking and what d'ya know there's only 9 being built per month and there's only 33 in the pool. That means there probably isn't going to be a replacement anytime soon. Probably. Anyway, there's a Pete aboard the I-19 now replacing his Glen so
until the replacement Glen is forthcoming I guess I'll use a Pete on those subs that are missing their Glen.

[larryfulkerson]

According to FOW about 5 Allied ships just pulled into the harbor at Georgetown and I just happen to have 3 Sally units within range and
one of them seems to be a CL and so I'm thinking maybe these boys are combatants and need to be rankled a little. So I took the Sally's
off the airfield mission and put them on naval attack hoping that they will go after the Allied boats when the rain moves away from
Georgetown. So um........there's a hard rain going on at Georgetown so I'd be surprised to see a Jap raid happen tonight or tomorrow.

[larryfulkerson]

I have these three CM types at Kendari that are waiting for the despensing of some type 93 mines and I have the 23rd Flotilla HQ unit at
Kendari and they are docked so where are the mines. Well, I looked and there's only 5 of them in the pool. So I'm guessing somebody
else is getting the mines instead of these guys. And one day it might be these guys's turn to get one each or something.

[larryfulkerson]

Balikpapan isn't nearly as busy as it once was. It's got only 1 incoming TF and that's TF 145. There are some TF's parked at Balik but
none of them are after the oil yet. Palembang and Miri are busy because of the fuel leaving those ports too. I'm going to have to get
serious about shipping some oil pretty quckly now because Tokyo is running lower all the time in oil. And fuel.

EDIT: I just now figured out that he's moving 7 hexes to get to Balik and 40 miles times 7 is the 280 endurance that TF 145 still has to
go to get to it's destination so each endurance unit is miles. That's probably in the manual somewhere and I forgot it or I'm too drunk.

[larryfulkerson]

Did I post something about Denpasar already? I don't remember......anyway Denpasar has an AF unit that's only V7 and he can't keep
up with the task at hand so I've been looking for some AF dudes to send that way. I think I've found our candidate, the 24th Bn has
graciously volunteered to work someplace else for a while. So I'm loading them for transport. I can't dock the ship they are loading.... I
hope that isn't a problem. If it is I'll just have to fragment the unit, the need is that urgent.

[larryfulkerson]

I got to looking around for a better place for this 36-plane Nate unit besides Catbalogan and I found Rabaul has no fighters so I thought
I'd convey these Nates to Rabaul and put them there just so Rabaul will have some fighters. I'm hoping numbers makes up for the lack
of quality. I'm guessing that Jim has some B-17's either already in Oz or on the way from Pearl / West Coast. Either way I expect some
attacks on Rabaul from Townsville or some of those other northern Oz bases. And who knows, he may take Port Moresby away from me
one of these days. I'm getting weaker as time passes and I'm not making much of a dent in him with all my aerial attacks and the
occasional naval bombardment thrown in there.

[larryfulkerson]

TF 165 is a CS w/ escort and I'm using it as the watchdog and rally point for the AO and the surface fleet that just wipped out an Allied
TF. I haven't looked yet but I'm betting those surface boys need to refit and rearm pretty badly and that now would be the ideal time for
Jim to have his carriers, all of them, just appear on the horizon headed my way. Me out here w/ no backup. I think it's time to head north
and relative safty. Next stop.......Tarawa, for now. And this is the best pattern I could get all the search planes to put out for me. I'm
using some overlap for a confidence builder and Just About Everywhere Important is covered so I'm going to go w/ this pattern.

[larryfulkerson]

TF 171 is an AMC that has just one float plane w/ just one pilot and the fatigue level is already 15% so I'm going to stand the pilot down
until we get to the Cocos and then see what the fatigue level is. That's two days rest, maybe enough to get into single digits? We'll
see won't we.

[larryfulkerson]

TF 183's name field says something about Hankow having so much resources on a certain date and I can use that plus today's date and
how much resources it has now to calculate that Hankow will run out of resources in approx. 20 days. So I have to have about 2 runs
per month from this ship to keep up w/ Hankow's demand. Should be doable.

[larryfulkerson]

Consider, if you will, the CVL Shoho who is carrying no aircraft at the moment. As you can see, she has some major damage to fix and is
headed for Yokohoma as we speak. She will arrive there either tonight or tomorrow early. I don't forsee any trouble getting her into the
repair shipyard so she should be seaworthy again shortly and I intend to staff her decks w/ some planes at Yokohoma, which has a good
variety to choose from. I'm leaning toward the Val's instead of Kates and I'll look around for some Zero's to give her. Those Claudes
look tempting but I'm not sure thay are carrier-capable. Besides being a lower quality that I've come to rely on.

[larryfulkerson]

Here's where everybody important is: ( you know how long it took to make that image? )

[larryfulkerson]

TF 198 is about to deliver about 28K of supplies to Truk which is a good thing because Truk is way way lower than I would want my hubs
to carry. I'm shooting for about 100K of each kind of goodie in Truk which may be way off the mark but that's my goal for now.

[larryfulkerson]

TF 253 is going to deliver 12 Kates to Rabaul sometime late tonight. That will give Rabaul some shooting planes instead of just the
occasional Mavis or two. I haven't decided whether or not to fly the Kates down to Tulagi or out to Kwaj. or what. In other words, I don't
have a good mental picture of the situation I'm in. Kwaj. is being threatened, or was yesterday and today and I'm thinking some Kates
might go well out there. But on the other hand there's no shooting planes in Rabaul yet and there's carriers passing close to there and
one of them might need a swap out of Kate organizations one of these days. That CV near Sydney.......I'll bet he could use some new
shooters by now.

[larryfulkerson]

TF 255 is an SC commanded ultimately by Lt Nagano, Peter. Yeah, his parents were US citizens and in the pre-war years he lived w/
them but there was a misfortunate car accident that took both his parents and he had to move to his grandparents home in Japan when
he was only about 15 years old. So now that he's serving in the IJN he finds that he has mixed feelings about his alegence. It's not that he wants to sabotage the SC or anything it's just that he sometimes feels that he's *supposed* to be serving on US ships. It's like some
task he's supposed to do that he hasn't done yet. And he's already such an outcast ( because of his American first name ) that he feels
like he dare not approach his CO about how he feels. He's just not a samori. He doesn't feel like being a warrior. And he feels no
affiliation to the Emperor at all. He doesn't fit in and knows it. Feels like he's being watched all the time. Has to watch what he says,
rehearse it in his mind first before he says it out loud 'cause the walls have ears. In a word: paranoid.