Solitaire game starting late '42

[EUBanana]

ORIGINAL: cfinch

italian navy get surprise on 9-1 split... make sense after all they surrendered!

Shades of the Battle of New Orleans there alright.

"And the Italian navy's most successful battle happened one month after the treaty had been signed...".

[EUBanana]

Sep/Oct 1943, Impulse #7, Allied go

CW/US have to take a naval action finally, unusually I've been putting it off. The Italian success is just a blip really, also there's a lot of BBs to support in Italy to get into position.

The rest land of course.

Feels weird doing convoy patrol duty so late in a turn. The Commonwealth Armada fills up Italian Coast, supply is restored.

Of more interest is prehaps the armada in the North Sea...

[EUBanana]

Fair bit of activity in the Coral Sea too but this is a bit less daring, just moving up Aussies to garrison and engineers to fix Rabaul's port.

The Solomons is only defended by LBA atm but quite a bit of it. The Japanese will have to ponder getting if getting their Jill out of Guadalcanal is worth it I guess.

[EUBanana]

American subs raiding the Bismarck Sea run into Japanese BB patrols there...

End result is everybody aborts, the US suffers a damaged sub too.

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Despite masses of Allied naval power, the Italian's post-surrender luck continues...

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Zara/Fiume sink the AMPH carrying two divisions. [X(]

And then escape.

And then this...

... kinda... ridiculous.

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Some Indian paratroopers go to Davy Jones' locker... [X(]

[EUBanana]

Then finally the Allied armada runs into them.

There's only a scattering of CVs and I decide that the Allies basically want the bug stepped on, so they dont actually go for a naval air combat, but a high damage (to both sides) surface combat instead. the Allies mainly use their points to increase the damage and smash the Italians back into port for a while.

Not... exactly as lucky as it could be.

[EUBanana]

But an old light cruiser being beaten like a drum is no price to pay at all for the Commonwealth, who have plenty of those.

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Then the naval action shifts to the Pacific where US submarines off Japan do quite horrible damage, given the samll size of the Japanese merchant marine...

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The Japanese have their revenge though... that was suicide, i shouldn't have done that. With just 4 surprise points I chose a submarine combat, which meant being pummelled by ASW, I should've just avoided and the SUB would live to fight another turn.

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The new Shturmoviks work on the German armour that's trying to mass in the tank country at the southern end of the front...

A BF109 defender is brushed away by the PE-3 escort, and then the Germans won't be attacking any time soon after all. Indeed the front is balanced so delicately here it might be that a Russian assault is now possible.

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The Il-2s are pretty decent!

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Looks like the odds are still poor for attacks, though, so aside from breaking up the German potential assaults that was it. Stalemate resumes.

In China Chiang tries to bomb the Japanese inthe north, but antiaircraft guns do a pretty good job stoppin that, so stalemate in China too.

[EUBanana]

The Japanese discover that the question is moot, they have no spare transport capacity. They can't even fix that hole in their convoy network t his turn. So all the Axis take a land action. Japan needs to get some more convoy points online... even the lacklustre US sub campaign is bad enough to hurt.

The Luftwaffe has plenty of units but not many targets, with the Russians all behind the Dnieper. Japan bombs the defenders of Wuhan with a Helen and flips a cavalry there.

Hata then takes Wuhan, so it was worth the oil after all. Odds were reasonable, and a decent roll. But Wuhan has flipped a few times. Maybe now with the Philippines and Malaya dealt with China can be more permanently pushed back, but it seems like China is a war that's supposed to never end.

[EUBanana]

As the Russians move extra units to the backwater near Novgorod, the Germans finally decide to do likewise, and move a lot of air power into the area. The Dnieper is quite a hard target now the Soviet airforce fights back. Also notice the armoured stack railed into Riga.

[EUBanana]

Oh wow and on a 2 the turn ends suddenly, and all those invasion fleets decide to go home.

So much for D-Day.

A 4-2 partisan in Yugoslavia... these Yugo partisans are serious business.

Japan reorgs its entire fleet. The Commonwealth actually misses a few as they had EVERYTHING out last turn. And then onto builds...

Germany has 47 BPs
2 pilot
4 FTR-2
1 LND-3
1 MNT
2 MNT-div
2 MECH-div
1 CAV
1 field arty
3 SUB (gearing, may as well)
1 naval construction (gearing, may as well)

Italy has 7 BPs, thanks to hoovering up the far north with their CAV.
1 naval repair
1 sub
1 TERR
1 fort
they basically have no units now, so had almost no choice.

Japan has 14 BPs
2 convoy
1 naval repair
1 sub repair
2 pilots
fighter-3
3 carrier air-1

bit thin on ground units but never mind...

China has 10 BPs
1 MIL as its Chungking and its in the right spot
1 PARA as they do have an ATR...
INF-div and a CAV-div

CW has 35 BPs
2 naval repair. They have a LOT of cruisers banged up. And some TRNs
4 pilot
3 FTR-3, lets get these Mossies out!
1 MOT
1 MECH
1 field art
1 CAV-div


US has 56
2 naval construction, they'll arrive at the very end but... I guess may as well?
3 naval repair, Commonwealth stuff mostly. Unfortunately got the CLs not the TRNs.
1 SUB construction
4 pilots
1 FTR-3
2 LND-4
2 FTR-2
1 MAR
1 MAR-div
1 Offensive


SU has 28
2 INF
2 field arty 6
2 FTR-2
1 LND-2
2 pilots

Rabaul just got repaired, so now the USN can breathe down the IJN's throat.

[EUBanana]

Well, the weather is bad. But the Allies have the initiative.

I notice the Philippines is nice and clear in winter. I really shouldn't have waited until summer for Japan...

[EUBanana]

In that weather it looks like it's gonna be quiet. And no doubt the U-Boats will prowl.

So... naval actions from the sea powers, land from the rest.

A Dauntless, a 2 Beauforts and P38 fly to the Bismarck Sea from Rabaul, probably a bit dangerous but Japan will have to fly a lot more air cover now if they want to keep using Truk.

They don't bother anywhere else as its storms across most sea zones.

There's basically 3 major Allied fleet build ups, the North Sea t he big one, the Coral Sea and the Italian Coast. The North Sea has a huge invasion fleet, though with only 3 old CW BBs to support.

4 INF
1 MAR (CW)
1 MAR-div (CW)
2 ARM
2 ARM-HQ
1 INF-HQ
1 MOT-div
1 INF-div
1 antitank

Plus XVIII Para at Plymouth.


In Italian Coast are basically all the KGV battleships + heavy escort for supply + 2 CVs. Montgomery and two CW MOT are aboard, I'm trying to keep the Italian effort CW boots on the ground for ease of organisation. 1 Canadian armour is at Cape St Vincent atm but will land at the end of the turn in Italy or near by it, so the Italian campaign is still very much a thing.

In the Pacific the US has designs on Guadalcanal just to mop up, and Kwajalein because it's a very useful spot. Currently the only significant US fleet is deployed at the Coral Sea. However I'm trying my raider tactic to box in the IJN again by surrounding them with cruisers, this time with some air support. the 2 box in Bismarck Sea has Nashville and Brooklyn, 2 navs and 2 fighters. the Solomons 3 box has Augusta and Northampton,with two P38s and a Helldiver and a B17 adjacent for emergencies at the moment. CL Phoenix is in the 4 box of the Marianas, with a Catalina and a Hudson nearby.


Lexington 2 / Langley is at Pearl Harbour ready to go, and Lexington 1 is at the West Coast having just loaded up, so along with Nimitz there's a reserve albeit a slow one of two big CVs + Langley.


As for the Japanese right now, Japan only has Hiryu / Kaga / Chiyoda / Zuiho / Chitose at Truk with decent air groups. Shoho and Zuikaku at Japan, Akagi empty at Japan, and Ryujo and Soryu at Canton which is sort of the counter to any Commonwealth incursions. Plenty of LBA but only of use as far as the Solomons at a push.

[EUBanana]

American subs dont find anything but there's an odd little cruiser action in the Bismarck Sea... So basically the US bloodlessly clears out the convoy.

Japan put a NAV and a Zero in the 0 box so why waste fighters. The US may be a lot bigger economically but shipping aircraft from the US that far is a PITA... and the raiders succeeded in being a pain in the ass, which is all their job is really.