The Good The Bad & The Indifferent

[Canoerebel]

Fun House

[Canoerebel]

4/15/44

A quietly productive day across the map. Tomorrow things will heat up a bit, as the Allies will invade Cebu...and an enemy carrier force between Truk and New Guinea does...I'm not sure what.

[BBfanboy]

I think a lot of the IJA supply in Burma is brought up on the single rail line that ends at Chiang Mai. If you have any units that can slip down the back road from Taung Gyi and march to Chiang Mai, or enough paratroops to drop on it, I think John would have to pull his troops back from everything north of Rangoon.

Note that it is a moderately long hike through jungle for any units he wants to march to an Allied-held Chiang Mai. Jungle rough hexes slow movement to two miles a day. Marching down the rail line might yield five miles a day.

[crsutton]

ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

4/14/44

The game has slowed a bit as John has had a series of real life adventures and misadventures that took a lot of time. But today we resumed the war. It was a quietly, productively good day across the map

Burma: The map shall speak for itself.

Fun House: The next map shall speak for itself.

The thing I don't like about an Allied overland attack into Burma is that once committed your forces are effectively bottled up in Burma until you take Rangoon or perhaps sidestep Rangoon and take Moulmein. If the attack is stalled there is just no option to abandon the attack and go elsewhere, and there really is very little that is strategically attractive in Burma. I made a bad mistake and invaded Pegu but did so without enough force (a common practice of mine) to seize Rangoon outright. My opponent has just kept moving in reinforcement and has plugged me up in Burma. I will slowly take it but the last thing I wanted was to get bogged down there when there are so many vulnerable flanking options. The only good thing is that it is a grinding affair which in the end works for the Allies. Giving your fine position in the PI though it is not such a big deal. He is going to have to devote fewer ships and units to the Burma theater and you should then be able to force Rangoon.

[Canoerebel]

That's not an issue here because the Allied army in Burma is so small. I have one UK division, four Indian divisions, and some orphan units (a US RCT, the Burma army, etc.) This breakthrough was made possible almost entirely by Allied air power, by the Japanese army trying to stand in clear terrain, and by John's belated effort to pull back.

The intent here is simply to draw John's attention and assets. My army is so small that I don't expect it to go anywhere important for a long, long time to come (after reinforcements, much later). I've tried to explain before, probably unartfully, that I want John's army fighting forward in Burma - not retiring in good order somewhere else. So the status quo suits me.

That said, I would take a breakthrough if it resulted in John becoming further stressed and committing more troops and air units to the theater.

[jwolf]

You could really cross him up by invading Sumatra again. He wouldn't expect that. [:D]

[Canoerebel]

That would be great, but it's one of those things that seems great in "isolation" (ie, apart from the realities of the current game).

In the context of the game now it wouldn't work. I've spent a year shifting my forces and setting up logistics to handle the campaign in a certain manner. That has resulted in Fun House, which is far closer to John's heart than is Sumatra or Java or Borneo. So I won't be looking backwards anytime soon. I'll keep going forward. Eventually, once KB is neutralized, I'll attend to key enemy bases in the rear, both to shut down oil production and to seek points need for a game-terms victory (some enemy bases are worth a lot of points, but John will also be hiding ships in little ports and dot hexes when his empire truly collapses).

But I don't actually expect the game to go that far. Once KB and the Kaigun truly collapse, I think John will concede. That may be a long time away...or it may not.

[Canoerebel]

John sent word 2.5 hours ago that he was running the next turn. Usually it takes him 1.0 to 1.5 hours to do a turn. This one is far longer than usual. Either he got disrupted by real life things or something has his full attention.

[Canoerebel]

4/16/44

A quietly productive day across most of the map, interrupted only by the loud, clanging announcement: "...spotted enemy carriers!"

John's concealment of his carriers for so long slowed the pace of Allied operations as I had to attend carefully to security. Let's see if he has good reason for showing them now. I've taken some steps to batten down the hatches in the DEI. As for the PI, let's see if he moves there or if he veers away.

[Alpha77]

ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

The intent here is simply to draw John's attention and assets. My army is so small that I don't expect it to go anywhere important for a long, long time to come (after reinforcements, much later). I've tried to explain before, probably unartfully, that I want John's army fighting forward in Burma - not retiring in good order somewhere else. So the status quo suits me.

I know what you did there [;)]

[Canoerebel]

I'll tell you one thing I did - I moved half an army out of Burma more than a year ago. In January '43, the Allies were on the offensive in Burma. Things looked promising. I had one British division, one American division, two Australian divisions, and two or three Indian divisions involved in the assault. I withdrew the Americans and the Australians; those three divisions went to the USA and are now involved in the Pacific War. One or two Indian divisions eventually took their place on the front lines. So, January '43 = six or seven divisions; April '44 = five divisions, only one of which is a major power division.

[Lokasenna]

Looks like he wants to smash some bases and ancillary shipping around the Moluccas/Mindanao area. Unless you have several unprotected (and large) groups of ships here, I'm not sure how this could possibly benefit him. My gut-level assessment of his pattern of KB use is that he keeps trying to hit the area you just left whenever you start a new op, seemingly thinking that there would be VPs there to harvest, and it keeps not working. I wonder if he'll change it up sometime.

[Canoerebel]

John had success moving into the vaccum to retake Celebes, but with KB he's largely drilled dry holes. His posting of KB in the Solomon Sea turned out terribly for him. Posting it in CenPac while Fun House is happening in the Philippines may be equally costly.

I have some decent shipping in the DEI. He can score some points and take out some nice transports. But the cost will be high, both in terms of his own assets (I have good CAP and some combat ships to ward off bombardments) and opportunity costs.

Michael will laugh at me, but I think this is really a psychological block. John simply doesn't want to commit KB in a suicide run. He's a navy guy first, even above his love of playing the Japanese. He won't banzai. He's trying to come up with clever ways to avoid the reality of the situation he's in.

I think.

[JohnDillworth]

I don't get it. Seems he is holding the KB until the "next battle". Just about out of next battles at this point. You really might only need to do one more major operation to put the dagger under the ribs. Not too many more chances. Fleet in being I guess.

[crsutton]

ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

That would be great, but it's one of those things that seems great in "isolation" (ie, apart from the realities of the current game).

In the context of the game now it wouldn't work. I've spent a year shifting my forces and setting up logistics to handle the campaign in a certain manner. That has resulted in Fun House, which is far closer to John's heart than is Sumatra or Java or Borneo. So I won't be looking backwards anytime soon. I'll keep going forward. Eventually, once KB is neutralized, I'll attend to key enemy bases in the rear, both to shut down oil production and to seek points need for a game-terms victory (some enemy bases are worth a lot of points, but John will also be hiding ships in little ports and dot hexes when his empire truly collapses).

But I don't actually expect the game to go that far. Once KB and the Kaigun truly collapse, I think John will concede. That may be a long time away...or it may not.

Besides, you get a solid hold on the PI and Sumatra does not matter much anymore.

[Canoerebel]

A year ago, while discussing long-range plans, I wrote that there would be two major operations after Big Tent - this one and one other. That other one is planned for the autumn months. If John is still hanging in there as we go into 1945, then there may be others. But from the outset, the three-fold plan was to: (1) attrition the IJ Navy; (2) disrupt John's oil LOCs; and (3) obtain the airfields necessary to implement a strategic bombing campaign against Home Island industry.

The wheels can still come off. The only way I really see that happening is if John won a big carrier battle, isolated the Philippines, and destroyed my army. That would be tough to recover from.

Aside from that, I'm in position and on schedule to carry through with the three-fold plan.

[JohnDillworth]

A year ago, while discussing long-range plans, I wrote that there would be two major operations after Big Tent - this one and one other. That other one is planned for the autumn months. If John is still hanging in there as we go into 1945, then there may be others. But from the outset, the three-fold plan was to: (1) attrition the IJ Navy; (2) disrupt John's oil LOCs; and (3) obtain the airfields necessary to implement a strategic bombing campaign against Home Island industry.

The wheels can still come off. The only way I really see that happening is if John won a big carrier battle, isolated the Philippines, and destroyed my army. That would be tough to recover from.

Aside from that, I'm in position and on schedule to carry through with the three-fold plan.

(in reply to JohnDillworth)

Well you might start to consider the order of those goals. Knock # 1 down to # 3. Can't attrit a navy that just won't engage

[Canoerebel]

#1 is the fastest, most efficient way to victory. The way to further #1 is to keep going, putting John in a position where he has to attack...until he attacks.

Fun House is already making progress in that regard. The Great Destroyer Slaughter a week ago (the one that prompted John to remark, "It was like watching Friday the 13th) was a step in the right direction.

[ny59giants]

Michael will laugh at me, but I think this is really a psychological block. John simply doesn't want to commit KB in a suicide run. He's a navy guy first, even above his love of playing the Japanese. He won't banzai. He's trying to come up with clever ways to avoid the reality of the situation he's in.

No laughter here. IMO, John will get ready to throw in the towel once KB is reduced even further. It will be like losing the queen in chess. In this game, the queen doesn't have much help left defending the king (Japan) and he will lose interest once she is gone.

Edit - I really don't see this game reaching '45.

[Canoerebel]

4/17/44

Today was a noisy, momentous day. I think John is setting up a Hammer and Anvil attack in the DEI using KB...and he has deployed three BBs to the Bay of Bengal.

Burma: Those BBs bombarded Akyab to good effect, doing moderately-heavy damage to the airfield and destroyed 50 or so aircraft on the ground...but, my goodness! those are key assets way out of position.

Allied bombers destroyed more enemy aircraft on the ground. The Japanese also shock attacked the lonesome UK brigade SE of Prome, but the Provisional Tank Regiment arrived in time just tear up the Japanese units, especially the tanks.

With a handful of my bomber squadrons temporarily out of commission, they'll upgrade to better aircraft.

I don't think I'm any closer to busting through in Burma, but the objective of drawing John's assets to this theater has been spectacularly met.