17 January 1942
Don’t Need No Stinking PP’s
First the bad news: The Lexington’s pumps failed just south of Melbourne. RIP.
Burma/India – Nothing much has been happening here other than Calcutta will be at level 7 airfield soon. I need to upgrade some fighters! Also, a couple of Hurricane squadrons are heading in from Aden, and once they arrive, the rest of the AVG will be relieved from Rangoon to go to China, IF I have any PP’s to do that with…. I know you don’t need PP’s to go there, but I would like to match the Air HQ in Chungking.
Singapore – The forts are at level 4 now and no bomber attacks in a while. The Japanese have been sending wave after wave of Oscars on sweeps. The shops at the Singapore airfield are full of broken airplanes – the fighters have stood down for now. Newly arrived is an actual recon unit so I will have a better idea of what is in JB soon. Japanese subs infiltrated the waters between Palembang and Singapore, sinking two supply laden AKL’s in a single turn. The Elektra and the Express, two British DD’s with an ASW rating of 8 jumped all over one of the subs, hitting it 11 times. In the same turn, a Dutch submarine, passing through the area, put a torpedo into the other one; I love those Dutchies! More AKL’s are heading into the area to resume supply transport duties – we recently had a scare in the DEI and evacuated most of the shipping temporarily.
The DEI – Three transports with two light AA LCU’s docked in Oosthaven this turn while another transport is about to unload a Hurricane squadron at Tjilatjap. These were going directly to Oosthaven, but the Japanese are getting more active in the area and I didn’t want to risk this precious cargo. It will unload here, move by rail to Batavia for reassembly, and fly to Palembang.
A couple of turns ago a BB TF sailed into the northern Java Sea.
Identified in this TF are the following ships:
BB Haruna
BB Kongo
CA Ashigara
CA Maya
DD Asagiri
These ships were hit by wave after wave of LBA from Palembang and Batavia, but the only hits scored were one torpedo and two 500 GP bombs on the Haruna, and one 500 GP bomb hit on the Maya. All of these hits were cored by Dutch Vildebeests, the unfortunate thing was that I did not have enough torpedoes in the inventory at Palembang for both strikes. This oversight has been rectified. Following this attack, the Japanese TF fell back, I am not sure where, and Palembang has been targeted by recon flights.
Also notable, the Nells based out of northern Borneo are now escorted by large numbers of Zeros – they attacked the two British submarine killers at Palembang, but scored no hits; hitting DD’s from 11,000 ft. cannot be easy!
In China, my Sally CAP trap worked out pretty well:
Morning Air attack on 35th Chinese Corps, at 91,38 , near Chengting
Weather in hex: Severe storms
Raid spotted at 19 NM, estimated altitude 5,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 6 minutes
Japanese aircraft
Ki-21-Ic Sally x 42
Allied aircraft
I-15-III x 1
H81-A3 x 8
Japanese aircraft losses
Ki-21-Ic Sally: 5 destroyed, 6 damaged
No Allied losses
Morning Air attack on 35th Chinese Corps, at 91,38 , near Chengting
Weather in hex: Severe storms
Raid spotted at 14 NM, estimated altitude 9,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 4 minutes
Japanese aircraft
Ki-21-Ic Sally x 25
Allied aircraft
H81-A3 x 4
Japanese aircraft losses
Ki-21-Ic Sally: 3 destroyed
No Allied losses
I am looking forward to getting these guys into better airplanes:
The 12 B-17’s in Burma/India have changed HQ’s and are now flying out of Chungking, having hit Canton for 1 Heavy Industry point. For long range aircraft like these, China has a wealth of targets to hit. Doing so, even with small numbers of B-17’s will help to hinder Japanese supply efforts in the region and provide a nuisance factor where they will need to think about protecting those assets. I am very seriously considering sending the DEI B-17’s there to help, but that will be a while: they flew a “turn too far” and flew into a Zero CAP at Kendari. Several planes need repair in a addition to losing a couple of bombers.
Down near Koepang, the Japanese TF that was sneaking out of the DEI headed southwest for a turn and then turned back towards Koepang. It is a BB TF including the following ships:
BB Mutsu
BB Yamashiro
Hudsons, newly based out of Broome, have succeeded in a single hit on the Yamashiro with a 250 lb. SAP bomb. I am not sure if this penetrated the deck armor, but even if it did, it was unlikely to do much damage. If the TF decides to stay in the vicinity very much longer it will be facing bombs much heavier than 250 lb.
An annoyance attack was staged on Canton Island last turn here two small CA TF’s bombarded the island, and a DM left a few gifts behind:
Night Naval bombardment of Canton Island at 153,143
Allied Ships
CA San Francisco
CA Minneapolis
CL Honolulu
CL Phoenix
DD Phelps
DD Selfridge
DMS Hovey
Airbase hits 7
Runway hits 11
Port hits 7
Port fuel hits 2
CA San Francisco firing at Canton Island
CA Minneapolis firing at Canton Island
CL Honolulu firing at Canton Island
CL Phoenix firing at Canton Island
DD Phelps firing at Canton Island
DD Selfridge firing at Canton Island
DMS Hovey firing at 52nd Naval Guard Unit
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Night Naval bombardment of Canton Island at 153,143
Allied Ships
CA New Orleans
CL Helena
CL St. Louis
CL Detroit
CL Raleigh
DD Downes
DD Shaw
DD Ralph Talbot
Airbase hits 4
Airbase supply hits 5
Runway hits 22
Port hits 15
Port fuel hits 2
Port supply hits 5
CA New Orleans firing at Canton Island
CL Helena firing at Canton Island
CL St. Louis firing at Canton Island
CL Detroit firing at Canton Island
CL Raleigh firing at Canton Island
DD Downes firing at 52nd Naval Guard Unit
DD Shaw firing at Canton Island
DD Ralph Talbot firing at Canton Island
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TF 140 encounters mine field at Canton Island (153,143)
Japanese Ships
DD Yayoi, Mine hits 1, heavy damage
My analysis: Skyros has realized that he has a bigger problem in the western DEI than he anticipated, perhaps my earlier Siir Robin’s in Malaysia, southern Burma, and the PI led him to believe that would be my overall strategy. Depending on what his recon flights over Palembang are telling him, he has to now account for this major thorn in his side. He hasn’t hit Palembang from the air directly yet, but bombing the place into submission will be a very expensive proposition as it will shortly be the most heavily AAA defended hex on the map, and the airfield is growing to level 5 with accompanying numbers of Aviation Support accumulating. I am interested to see what he does to handle this, but I will bet quite a lot that it will involve carriers. It will take a lot of fuel to blockade Java and Sumatra.
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Things are heating up in the DEI.....
