April 10th, 1944
Some night bombing, ineffective of Osaka. Irving Sa intercept and get one bomber. Given the paucity of night bombing, I have switched 1 Irving squadron and one Nick squadron over to training. I will move the Nick D squadron (49 planes) to Port Arthur and put split it into thirds and use one third on night duty, and 2/3 on daytime CAP. I tried the Irving Sa in a daytime deep area CAP, and they simply don't work well at all during the day.
An empty xak-t gets hit by a torpedo south of Shanghai. E's put six hits on the sub, and should force it to return to Hokkaido or Marianas for repairs. The xak-t should live, although she has 20 fires so nothing is sure.
No bombing or sweeps of Honshu deep. Some bombing of unprotected Hachinohe. The first J2M3 squadron is staffed with planes and Tracom pilots.
Over in the far west, the Allies move 7 units east along the road to the central plains of Thailand. No movement towards Bangkok or Ayuthia. But both are bombed fairly heavily. Ayuthia simply cannot be held as the bombing is just too effective. I look at the comparable effectiveness of bombing at Bangkok and Uttaradit and wish I had built the forts much higher in Ayuthia. Uttaradit with forts 4 is almost immune; while Bangkok is tolerable. Supply is now just a little low at Bangkok and fine at Ayuthia so that problem almost solved for now.
Of my two little surprises last turn, the first spotted only 1 ship at extreme range and the kamikazes didn't fly. My timing must be off, or I counted hexes wrong, or the Allied fleet paused to refuel. [&:]
Over in the Andamans, I manage to catch the CVE task force, and sneak in a dive bombing run at them, escorts are at 1-1 parity versus CAP, however his were Corsair II and mine were Zekes. Radar gives him plenty of time to be waiting and formed up -- So no joy...I was hoping to catch another task force, but I was 1 hex off.
For the day I lose 30+ planes total, and the Allies lose 20+.
1 more day and the Fuso can steam away from Singers...still loading a convoy of fuel from Singers, should finish today and leave. The Allies expand their conquest in Malaya past Georgetown, forcing an INA unit to retreat to Alor Star (they did it in good order).
Another large troop convoy arrives at Luzon with all sorts of support troops from Babeldoab. From there they will head to China/Hokkaido/Japanese Islands.
Over 5K in Assault Value in ground pounders over the next 90 days. All needed.
