Catfished! A grudge match - Cheesesteak (J) v. Aaffins (A) BTS

[aaffins]

Probably an apt description. I think the American ships that arrive later may have slightly better night exp ratings? Actually something I should look at.

4/14/42
First big hit on the field at Kalgoorlie - he's moved up to 7,000 feet to avoid the Bofors I think. He knocks out 2 USAAF fighters and damages ~20 along with 70+ hits on the airfield. However our flak still bags 2 Bettys and damages over half his bombers.

We launch a counterattack at Ranchi on his vanguard (we had seen them pulling back so figured now or never) with some of our stronger units (70th Div, US armor, etc). We only get 1:2 odds, but he takes nearly 3x casualties (~100 squads) and has a negative supply modifier. His units are cut off from any major resupply route.

4/15/42
IGD and some armor units eliminate a rear guard in far Eastern India, destroying a base force and Inf battalion.

We attack again at Ranchi, adding more units in an attempt to eject him and cause major casualties. We get 1:1 odds but not the victory we hoped for. We still disable 90 squads although we get a ton (48) of vehicles destroyed. These were mostly Improvised Indian AFVs so no big deal, but that's kind of a stupid way to give away VPs.

4/16/42
I CAP Howrah and a moderate aerial battle ensues. Two RAF squadrons and six P-38s I've scraped together do pretty well (approx 1:1) against the first Zero sweep but the follow on of Oscars gets that numerical advantage and we end up on the short end of the battle.

90th IJA Div escapes Ranchi, leaving the 55th Regt alone, we eject them with 60 squads destroyed. The remnants of that unit as well as the 5th Tank and 90th Div are still trapped between Asansol and Ranchi. Asansol now has two Aussie brigades and Forts are up to size 2. We should be able to hold. Potential for a nice score here.

[RangerJoe]

Somebody needs to check the vertical range of the Bofors 40mm. [8|]

[aaffins]

Whoops sorry you are 100% correct, Oerlikons rather than Bofors

[aaffins]

4/17/42

A fairly quiet turn overall. He captures Jessore - across the river from Calcutta - with two tank regiments, I had mostly pulled out, this was just a delaying action.

He's starting to really discover the potency of DBB AAA after flying Lilies over Calcutta at 5K feet and Betties over Kalgoorlie at 8K

[aaffins]

4/18/42

In China we put up the AVG over Chungking and they do fairly well against sweeping Zeroes and Oscars - 2:1. Unfortunately none are still up to prey on the Betties. He hasn't really concentrated enough air power to shut down the airfield, but I have moved most CAF planes to Kunming aside from the fighters we flew in today.

I've been a little confused by his China strategy for awhile, but I'm pretty sure I get it now. Rather than try to clear all the pockets I have entrenched in good terrain and at Changsha out, he's going for Chungking first so he has fewer troops tied down by garrisons and, I presume most importantly for him, destroyed units won't respawn. The obvious issue here is it leaves him a hell of a supply line to protect. There are a couple ways he can trace major roads from Shanghai and Canton to his front line units. Right now a route from Shanghai is actually open so I move a unit in Southern China to correct that. We have some units in the woods near Kukong he's been trying to dislodge for a while. Now I get why that's the one place he's been fighting: they block the supply line from Canton.

In India he shifts his attention to Howrah and knocks out 10 planes on the ground. Still a good amount of flak and he loses nearly as many planes to AAA. Doubt we'll be seeing Vals used for AF attack any time soon again. I realized that I can put the C-47s that would normally be flying the hump to use by flying Burmese troops out of the small airfields along the border, many are damaged in this raid. Tomorrow we put up the fighters and see if we can catch him.

At Kalgoorlie we don't contest the skies but our AAA prevents serious damage to the AF. We also have tons of engineers, so it's difficult to close the AF without a huge concerted effort. He tries to take Esperance with paras but they fail. We just have a base force there.

4/19/42
At Howrah the fighters are very disappointing despite having 121 planes on CAP, most of which were newer model Hurricanes or P-40s. We've been getting at least 1:1 if not better with these groups pretty consistently, but not today. 77 Zeroes beat us up with a kill/death ratio of about 1:2. Perhaps even more frustratingly a couple follow on Oscar groups take down another ~15 planes for just 2 reported kills and we don't have any planes up for the bombers. Not exactly sure what's changed, perhaps he's brought in more experienced pilots, but obviously putting up big wings on CAP is going to be something I have to be cautious about.

At Kalgoorlie it's a similar story to recent days - we leave air defense to our massed flak. Once again we see about a 1:1 exchange of IJN bombers for planes destroyed on the ground. I'm fine with this for now. He does now have a 4E Liz group operating so they may force me to change my thinking, but our AAA knocked a few down today, so I don't think I need to just yet. He's now up to 8k feet.

He arrives at Bataan with two divisions and plenty of arty. Won't last terribly long.

Merauke falls.

[aaffins]

4/20/42
The British 70th Div and a couple other units have pursued the IJA 90th Div and friends to the hex between Asansol and Ranchi. He launches what I think was a tank only attack and gets the 5th Tank Regt beaten up with 50 vehicles destroyed. These units have no supply route except through a jungle hex so I think we have them trapped. RAF bombers are hitting him but don't do a great deal of damage.

For some reason he tries to fly a large Betty raid on Kalgoorlie from 8,000 feet and loses at least half a dozen while causing minimal damage.

[BBfanboy]

Does the British 70th get some AV in this scenario? In stock, it is loaded with construction engineers and other support elements but has virtually no Infantry and no AV. And you can't combine any units with it to make it a real Division either.

[aaffins]

Yes, in this scenario the division is one unit rather than having the independent brigades in stock with the divisional formation being a strong support unit. This gives it one of the most powerful TOEs in the game, see below (Note my AAR is a bit behind where we are in game, hence the unit being deployed to Calcutta rather than between Ranchi and Asansol).

Unfortunately the trade off is that it's not possible to change the command away from Eastern Army, which means the unit isn't available for redeployment to Ceylon or use in Burma if you adhere to typical HRs (we do). Bit of an aside, but I think this is why going for India is kind of folly in BTS; your strength is at sea and, to a lesser degree, in the air. Those can be used in the Indian theater, but they're less decisive than in the Pacific.

[aaffins]

4/21/42
One thing I've noticed is that VAC does not seem to have established very good air search coverage over the Bay of Bengal, at least along the Indian coast. We test this by sending the old RN CLs Caledon and Ceres with a DD to bombard Diamond Harbour. We do a modest amount of damage but do establish the 28th Inf Div is located there. Not taking that place back any time soon. Also I believe that's a division he would have had to buy out from Korea.

Big sweeps over Kalgoorlie, Howrah and Chunking, but only small raids on Howrah. We shoot down 4 bombers and they do no damage. I'll be quite curious to hear VAC's take on the Allied AAA after we finish this game, if I were him I think I'd be pulling my hair out.

RAF bombers continue to harass the Japanese units between Ranchi and Asansol, but I'm reticent to attack with roughly equal AV, don't want the 70th Div to get beaten up and my Brit Inf replacements are basically non-existent.

The IJA does clear the jungle hex on the road to Kukong after about 2 months of trying. Only thing blocking the supply line from Canton to the rest of his forces now is Kukong which has forts but is unfortunately an open hex.

[RangerJoe]

If you lose India and he keeps it garrisoned, just ignore it. Plan on attacking Port Blair then Pegu. Go on to Sabang then cut Malaya off from Thailand. [:D]

[aaffins]

4/22/20
The Kalgoorlie raids are now up to bombing from 14,000 feet, which limits their effectiveness pretty severely. Don't think he can close the airfield unless he brings a lot more bombers.
My fighters launch low level attacks on his leading ground units. Nothing devastating, but we do disable some squads in the open terrain. This is more about harassment and delay.

A bombardment attack of the cutoff IJA units in India results in several squads destroyed, I'm guess he's low on supplies.

The IGD pushes the bulk of Burma Corps out of Kohmia, so I can't fly anymore troops out. I did get about 100 AV out using C-47s from Calcutta.

[aaffins]

4/23/20
We continue flying strikes on his units advancing on Kalgoorlie...small scale stuff, just USAAF fighters and RAAF (did that exist at this time?) Wirraways, but are causing some casualties. First time I've ever gotten any actual effect from a Wirraway, so I'm pretty excited about that.
Raids by Betty and Liz are a bit more worrisome than previous days as he knocks out six planes on the ground for just one downed by AAA. That's not a sustainable ratio but let's see if he can duplicate before we panic.

Major action is in India, where I order attacks at Asansol and the hex just outside on the road to Ranchi. All of his units except 5th Tank Regt. are now in the Asansol hex, so we easily destroy that unit. The action at Asansol is a bit more interesting. He made it into the hex and opened the opposite hexside on the road from Calcutta using the 1st Tank Regt. However his units didn't seem to be supplied because we rout him with a force only slightly larger we rout him with very heavy casualties. So that's a nice victory, however we miss out on the total destruction I was hoping for because even though his units have opposite hexsides open he's able to enter the hex and retreat out the opposite side the same turn. Did not know that was possible.
Overall, it's a good victory for us, we destroyed an armored unit he'll have to rebuild and destroyed 359 squads/devices. In my current thinking about avoiding auto-vic that's a big help. Here's the report:

Ground combat at Asansol (53,34)

Allied Deliberate attack

Attacking force 16898 troops, 247 guns, 473 vehicles, Assault Value = 657

Defending force 14769 troops, 129 guns, 95 vehicles, Assault Value = 429

Allied adjusted assault: 406

Japanese adjusted defense: 182

Allied assault odds: 2 to 1

Combat modifiers
Defender: leaders(+), disruption(-), preparation(-), fatigue(-)
experience(-), supply(-)
Attacker:

Japanese ground losses:
4061 casualties reported
Squads: 181 destroyed, 17 disabled
Non Combat: 119 destroyed, 62 disabled
Engineers: 4 destroyed, 5 disabled
Guns lost 32 (27 destroyed, 5 disabled)
Vehicles lost 52 (28 destroyed, 24 disabled)
Units retreated 2

Allied ground losses:
640 casualties reported
Squads: 3 destroyed, 63 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 11 disabled
Engineers: 2 destroyed, 7 disabled
Vehicles lost 18 (3 destroyed, 15 disabled)

Defeated Japanese Units Retreating!

Assaulting units:
1st Gloucestershire Battalion
7th Hussars Regiment
7th Cav Recce Regiment
21st Australian Brigade
18th Australian Brigade
2/2nd Pioneer Battalion
45th Indian Brigade
2nd Royal Tank Regiment
2/9th Fld RAA Regiment
1st Bombay Construction Battalion

Defending units:
55th Infantry Regiment
1st Tank Regiment
90th Division

Wyndham and Kahnsien fall.

[Alfred]

Australian military aviation came into being in 1912.  It underwent several name changes until 1921 when it became its own, separate from the army, military service with its definitive name, Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF).
 
Alfred

[aaffins]

4/24/1942

I have been trying to get a RAN/RN SCTF into position to make a run at the convoys unloading at Perth but he's got his air search set up well and a couple Netty strikes sink the CL Mauritius. I don't think there's a way to do this plan without losing precious ships.
Silver lining of this is that with the Netties distracted only a few Liz hit Kalgoorlie, doing no damage, although our AAA still gets one.

In India he puts a few Oscars to cover his retreating troop and bags a few RAF Blenheims, but they're not enough to really stop us and we inflict nearly 1,000 casualties on the disorganized enemy troops in open terrain.

Nookanbah falls.

[aaffins]

We're really moving through turns quickly now. With the key points defined there's a lot less to check. It's also part of my strategy to prioritize quick turns over being detailed. With my navy in such poor shape my options are limited, I think getting him turns quickly will play into some of VAC's habits to move fast, which I think could negatively impact his long term strategy.

Also just noticed I've been saying 2020 for the last few turns, oops.

4/25/42
He hadn't been bombarding Calcutta recently so I had moved some planes in. Not a good decision, a trio of cruisers bombard and take out 8 planes with many more damaged. RAF continues to bomb retreating troops with good effect, although we do lose a couple more planes to Oscar LRCAP.

Similar deal at Kalgoorlie, doing good damage but he gets some Zeroes out there on LRCAP which knock down a couple of planes.
His daily raid is moderately effective, destroys a couple planes on the ground but can't close the field. This is ok for now but obviously I can't bleed airframes like this indefinitely.

In China we try to break out our large ~2k AV force to assist Chungking. Doesn't work - we get 1:2 odds. I sent a cavalry hex from the opposite direction, perhaps I can take advantage of what I learned at Asansol and sneak past without displacing the enemy division?

[aaffins]

4/26/42
Pretty quiet turn...
His bombers over Kalgoorlie are now flying at 15,000 feet, with rain in the area almost completely ineffective and our AAA still gets one.

RAF continues hitting his retreating units, he's got bombers in action attacking Asansol now, I'll push some AAA forward. No plans to try to hold the base long term, too vulnerable in an open hex, but want to act as if I will in the spirit of delaying.

He's got a tank regiment raiding north towards Cawnpore, an Indian armored brigade catches up with them.

Zamboanga, Taytay and Myitkyina fall as does some mop up.

[aaffins]

4/27/42
The one theater where the Japanese have made no incursions to date is the North Pacific. A couple weeks ago I figured it was far enough along that I should start exploiting it. I've moved a sub tender forward to Dutch Harbor and set up some small convoys from Seattle for fuel and supplies. Also put an AVD and PBY squadron out at Attu to hopefully give us an early warning and moving infantry and engineers to Adak to build it up. The subs I'm not basing out of Dutch can interdict his supply convoys around Hokkaido and stay on station much longer than they could from Pearl, and S-boats with their working torpedoes can get in a couple days of patrol on station. We get our first couple of attacks today, unfortunately by a boat with non-working torpedoes.

In Australia I have a couple subs stranded at Darwin with no fuel. I'm trying to sneak some in using small dutch coastal TKs. VAC catches on and has Vals from PM, so I us LRCAP to conduct a small ambush near Cooktown, bagging a half dozen. Hopefully the tanker can sneak through now.

The Indian armored brigade chases off the enemy armored unit up near Patna with heavy casualties.

We were able to use that trick I mentioned a couple days ago to sneak the Chinese units NW towards Chungking, we'll see if we can make it through the forest before he catches on.

Exmouth falls.

[aaffins]

We're still clicking off the turns at a 2+/day pace, hard to keep up the AAR and maintain that thought. It's funny sometimes I just want to do the AAR and muse but I know he is (or maybe was) a big AAR reader, so if I post while I have the turn I feel like it kind of hurts my strat of pushing for turns as fast I can.

4/28/42
He's been trying to cover his troops advancing on Kalgoorlie with Zero LRCAP from Perth. That's pretty long range for LRCAP and we take advantage with a P-40 sweep, knocking down several. His bombers shift from the heavily protected Kalgoorlie airfield to an Aussie armored car unit we moved east to protect the rail line with devastating impact. We take over 600 casualties and the unit is combat ineffective. Lesson learned. Have to have AA protection. Our Wirraways, now joined by P-39s and RAAF Kittyhawks are actually doing a good bit of damage to his advancing units.

In China we get pushed out of the hex blocking the road to Chungking from Kweiyang...so that's not good. No way we can hold all the bases in the central plain without thinning out our forces too much. We do have 400 dug in AV at Kienko, which he discovers with a river shock crossing that costs him 3,600 troops.

He takes about 1,500 casualties in an attack at Bataan but we're taking lots of destroyed.

4/29/42
He gets some CAP up over the units we chased out of Jamshedpur/Asansol last week, so I guess that party is over. Between the forced retreat, low supply and week of RAF bombing those units have to be in terrible shape. Imagine it will be sometime before we hear from them again.

He's been attacking my armored unit around Patna for a couple days with limited effect. We put some LRCAP today and take down about 20 2E bombers. We also recapture Patna unopposed.

In Australia we get a big score; he had one regiment out front that arrived at Kalgoorlie first. I decide to launch an attack with my massed forces. A second unit, the IJA 4th Division, arrives before the attack goes in, but in move mode and we throw them and the 41st Inf Regt out with heavy casualties - nearly 4,500 - including more than 250 squads destroyed. That's a nice little victory from both a VP perspective and a strategic perspective as those units are going to need a lot of supply and time to get back in action.

Unfortunately I undo a lot of that good work by deciding to have one more go at the IJA 22nd Div blocking the road from Changsha to Chungking. Our shock attack results in 8,400 Chinese casualties including 325 squads destroyed. Oops.

[Bif1961]

minor victory fever? [:-]

[aaffins]

4/30/42
In India he starts bombing Asansol. I begin pulling out most of ground units, I don't see much value in fighting for an open hex when there will still be two other railway supply routes into Calcutta even if I lose it. I do move in some AA units to pick up some more easy kills. We're reporting 4 2E's downed this turn.

Normal raid on Kalgoorlie but he also loses 4 2E's here despite flying at 14,000 feet and doing comparatively little damage.

5/1/42
Sub warfare starting to pay off a little bit, we get a freighter off Hokkaido and a Sub in SoPac near New Caledonia.

With my depleted navy VAC takes the opportunity to raid my supply line from Pearl to the West Coast with some sort of carriers. He catches a 5 tanker convoy and sinks it. He only had 18 attack planes so I'm wondering if this is CVEs/CVLs. If they linger I guess I could consider using my CVs to try to take them out. Have to be very conservative about that decision obviously. In the meantime I'll need to route convoys carefully and get some YPs out as pickets.

5/2/42
Uh oh...trouble in Oz. He moves a tank regiment and two recon regiments around Kalgoorlie and cuts the rail line one hex out. I had an Engineering Bn. there trying to fortify and they're easily dispatched. I have over 100k supplies stockpiled at Kalgoorlie so this is not an immediate crisis but obviously we will eventually need supplies. I send a couple units out from Kalgoorlie to counter, most notably the US 159th Mot. Inf. Regt. which is back to about 85% strength after the Battle of Perth.