Banzais Don't Make Victories - Anachro (A) vs John 3rd (J) BTS 5.7

[Anachro]

August 30 1942

Another good air day in India as John sends 22 unescorted Helens once again to attack my cavalry unit east of Cuttack threatening to cut his rail line; my P-38's get some experience. Meanwhile, I send sweeps and bombers against Asanol while massing CAP there, doing decent damage to John's ground forces there while clearing his LRCAP and downing some Zeroes and Tojos. I send my 4Es against the tank regiment chasing my AFV unit east of Viza and tey damage or destroy 13 tanks.

On the offensive plans front, John has 2 divisions at Howrah and a weak garrison at Cuttack including 1 division north of it. I think I will focus my offensive there. A couple benefits of this is that it gives me another 4(7) airfield, cuts his forces in two, and Cuttack is not exposed to naval bombardment so I won't suffer damage from his ships. As I said, I have ~3k AV west of Jamshedpur and at Jamshedpur.



A lot of AA and CDs, etc. arrived today, which is nice. Another nice thing for the future is another motorized brigade arrived at Madras today (albeit with low morale and exp) and a supply convoy arrived at Capetown with 54 General Lee tanks (direly needed) and 60 M3A1 Armored Cars.



John has cruisers again at Ndeni. Does he expect me to move up with my carriers again so he can bring his carriers down suddenly and unexpectedly?

[Anachro]

Yes, my P38 pilots. Grow strong, grow more experienced, and DESTROY THE ENEMY. MUHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

[Anachro]

August 31 1942

Not much happens this turn, but John launches a massive bombing raid against Madras where I had removed my fighters to better protect my forces and airfields around Calcutta, which is the main area of importance. When the turn was running, I kept thinking, "My flak is really not doing anything, is it? Hmmm..." John all of his bombers at around 12,000 feet and my 28 3.7" Mk II guns don't do much.

The good news is that all John finds at Calcutta is a number of C-47 transports and Catalina's. For all his troubles, I only lose 12 C-47's and 5 PBY-5A's - and John loses nearly as many planes for various reasons throughout the day. Unfortunately, the Madras airfield is in bad shape at 81 service damage and 90 runway damage, but I do have a number of engineers there that can repair it.

[Anachro]

In the festive spirit, here is a blueberry pie I made from scratch that will be one of the desserts for the family tomorrow. The crust was also baked from scratch: flour, salt, water, vodka, and lots of butter! We'll also be having turkey, mashed potatoes and gravy, deviled eggs, brown bread, etc, etc. - it's like a mini Thanksgiving.

[Bif1961]

Let them eat pie!

[Anachro]

September 1 1942

John launches another massive raid on my airbase at Madras and while he is certainly doing a decent amount of damage there and the airfields are completely knocked out, the actual damage suffered by planes on the ground is more minimal. Indeed, for the day I lose one Audax I on the ground and 3 airplanes in total versus 13 Japanese planes for the day, including 6 lost to flak. To help prevent Madras being helpless in the future, I am building airfields at Bangalore and sending base units to Sallem to also build airfields for nearby LRCAP bases to be used if the need presents itself.

For now, John is amassing fighters at Howrah and Calcutta. He has 150 fighters and 6 bombers at Howrah. Between Jamshedpur, Ranchi, and Asanol, I have 300 fighters. Probably in the next week or so I will launch a full on sweep with heavy bombers arriving again against either of these targets. I await the repairing and maintenance of my heavy bombers. I have 48 at Raipur and an additional 24 that recently arrived at Bombay. Not all are operational.

I have 1k AV 2 hexes east of Sambalbur, which has a small garrison. I'll move on this. Another 1600 AV is on the outskirts of Cuttack, but I'm not sure if I want to march on this yet.

[bobsteele]

I think this one is over. IMO, John will quit by June 44. You are late into '42 and you have been counterpunching effectively. John doesn't deal with adversity very well, his late game with Canoerebel notwithstanding, if you effectively strand those troops in India, as you have a good chance to do, he may not last that long.

[adarbrauner]

ORIGINAL: Anachro

In the festive spirit, here is a blueberry pie I made from scratch that will be one of the desserts for the family tomorrow. The crust was also baked from scratch: flour, salt, water, vodka, and lots of butter! We'll also be having turkey, mashed potatoes and gravy, deviled eggs, brown bread, etc, etc. - it's like a mini Thanksgiving.

Well this looks good!

[Anachro]

September 2-3 1942

Another few days, another part of the Imperial Japanese Navy put to the bottom of the sea, but the next turn might be a bit hairy with potentially dangerous and destructive developments to my own forces. In the past week, I landed base units at Chuginadak Island and succesfully at Yunaska Island the last 2 turns, part of my effort to make John focus on the Aleutians. To protect this as I knew John had surface units up here, I brought along a few battleships, cruisers, and destroyers. They have performed their task well, absorbing the attacks of John's significant air forces at Adak and even protecting an incursion by a CL/DD force. In the middle of the night, CL Otonase and destroyer escorts sailed into Yunaska and met my battleships where the Otonase was sunk by a flurry of 15 inch and 6 inch shells. Allied radar detected the coming enemy force and prevented Japanese surprise.



In the ensuing air attacks during the day, John's fighters easily escorted his bombers through my LRCAP but they were not able to do significant damage and were repelled effectively by flak. The only downside is that BB Resolution and an American AK took a torpedo each. While I'm not sure if the AK will survive (a shame as these are useful ships), the BB took relatively minor damage and my forces should be in decent shape to retire.



This is a good thing as not only does my nav search spot John's surviving destroyers returning to Adak from their attack on Yunaska Island, but also spots what could be a much more powerful BC or CA force 2 hexes east of Adak Island. While my amphibious forces have not finished unloading, I think it is time to flee full speed east. I'm not worried about my surface units, but my transports are slow. We'll see what happens.

[Anachro]

In India, my units clear a small garrison battalion southeast of Patna. John has 40k troops at Howrah, 66k at Asanol, and 5 units with maybe 1-3 divisions just east of Asanol. Cuttack seems to have 1 division and 15k men in total (8 units), and Sambalbur has 4 units and 3k men. I have 1000 AV arriving on the outskirts of there next turn.

[Anachro]

I don't want my British friends to get mad at me, so I changed "American radar" to "Allied radar" in my first post. The major ships involved were British, after all.

[Anachro]

September 4 1942

The Aleutians are calm today as a combination of thunderstorms preventing John's air wings from attacking, lack of aggression from him not sending any naval units in full speed, and also my sending my units west full speed means no ships are sunk up there this day. My surface ships will return to Seattle for minor repairs and some cruisers will move back to my main supply hub at Kodiak. My AK that was hit by a torpedo yesterday was disbanded in port at Yunaska and while the fires are out today, she is still heavily damaged. I will move her to Chuginadak tomorrow and then from there onwards. Unfortunately, John had DL on Yunaska and probably knows I have ships in port there.



In India, I launch a large series of air raids on Sambalpur for little gain. My units will probably be at Sambalpur in 3 days for an attack on it. My air raids revealed the base to have a medium artillery unity, a JNAF unit, a construction unit, and one more unspecified unit. This will give me another air base close to Cuttack, which is nice. More interstingly, John seems to have 40 bombers and no fighters at Cuttack (though he might move some here to give LRCAP to Sambalpur tomorrow). I think this is an opportunity for another good airfield bombing raid.

John moved 1 unit northwest of Howrah and spots my units south of Jamshedpur, though I doubt he has good DL on them.

[Anachro]

The BC Constellation, which took a torpedo or two from a sub outside of Sydney back in early '42, is nearing a completion of her extensive repairs. In the mean time, she also managed to significantly upgrade to her anti-aircraft defenses. This was all done at Cape Town, where she would be safely "off-map." Her, her crew and captain, and CINCPAC are eagerly looking forward to her re-entering combat duty. I'm also sure her men are thoroughly sick of South Africa and Cape Town after spending more than 110 days there. I wonder if Japanese estimates consider her to have been sunk... Her sister ship is currently at Pearl Harbor.

[Anachro]

Secret Mission 23 - Testing out Japanese naval search patterns for raiding opportunities. Being done elsewhere as well.

[Anachro]

September 5-6 1942

Not much to report. My bombers find Cuttack with no CAP but do surprisingly little damage to the 40 bombers on the ground there. The airfield itself is somewhat roughed up. My units are marching on Sambalpur and will be in it in 2 days and should take in through one day's worth of combat. My planes will rest for a bit before re-commencing a campaign of attrition. There are 3 units north of Cuttack with perhaps a division or more. I have ~1100 AV moving on the hex with an additional 500 AV behind them. In the DEI, a task force of 5 submarines carrying mines runs into a minefield of the enemy's at Merak north of Batavia. 3 of 5 are damaged but not so as to cause them to sink. 4 will continue on to their mining target and one will return home for repairs.



The most surprising thing is the AK in my Aleutian operation is alive as well as can be hoped as is currently safely in port at Dutch Harbor before continuing on for repairs in the west coast. This means no ships were lost in this operation in return for sinking an old Japanese CL, which is nice. John commented in his email about his frustration seeing ~60 torpedoes dropped for only 2 hits. I guess he now knows some of my own pain with my dive bombers.

[Anachro]

September 7-8 1942

India
We reach and find just one division on the outskirts of Cuttack, the IJA 16th division divided into three (A, B, C) parts. We attack on the 8th, but the Jungle hex prevents us and both sides take equal number of causalities, but we suffer more permanent attrition in the form of destroyed squads. We will attack again tomorrow and our cavalry unit will move down to the rail line to prevent reinforcements. At Sambalpur, our units enter the hex and should take it tomorrow against a meager enemy garrison. Most of the units here are India with one US army division which will move to Jamshedpur after taking the base.

I do a number of sweeps with fighters over Howrah and John's division near Cuttack, but find only a few Tojos of CAP that are promptly destroyed. John's comments to me in the email on his thoughts on the Indian situation. Let's not talk about the sheer number of fighters Japan has + its ability to produce fighters (and train pilots) way beyond what its industrial capacity was ever capable of. Moreover, I roughly estimate there to be around 10-12 Japanese divisions in India. I suspect the Japanese interior beyond the front-lines is woefully undefended.

I cannot believe the sheer number of Fighters you are deploying in India! People complain about the Mod but I might choose to argue with them.

SoPac/CenPac

Here's something interesting. We discovered a hole in John's naval recon on the approach to the Marshall Islands. Kwajalein is 17 hexes away and can be attacked tomorrow by my carriers if I flank run in. Should I or should I move a few hexes (3-4) further so I can do a normal run in the next turn? I have no idea what's at Kwajalein but it's one of his larger ports in the Marshall's, sigint showed ships in port there last turn (no idea what) and radio activity. From my experience so far in this game, John has a tendency to station ships on his front lines, such as it seems at Tabiteuea.

My raiding task force has 4 American carriers, 2 American light carriers, and 1 British carrier for a total of 465 planes.

What to do? Hmmm....decisions, decisions...

[Anachro]

Look what I spotted moving southeast between Jarvis Island and Pago Pago. It seems John is up to his raiding ways again. He just cannot help himself I wonder if he cares at all about the fuel cost of continually sending lots of fuel-hogging carriers and escorts down this far south. The nice thing is this means his carriers are far away from my own and, furthermore, I have ample warning to move my supply convoys out of danger.

After the last raid John sent towards Tahiti (clearly the target of John here), I put an AV and some PBY's at Starbuck Island and it was thanks to them this was spotted.

[JohnDillworth]

Are those the CVL's with the 16" thick armored decks and 34 knot speed? Those are John III fantasy ships so they probably get 54 mpg and don't burn any fuel at all. Can't sink those so steer clear

[Bif1961]

Figures PBY jockeys would be hanging out at Starbucks.

[Anachro]

The turn has been sent. We hope for good news outside of Cuttack and at Sambalpur tomorrow. We are also very interested to see what our carriers find at Kwajalein.