The Long and Full of it - scen 15, Nov 2005

[alfrake]

program version 1.60, scenerio 15, historic first turn

I've spent way too many hours reading these last night and decided to give my own a try. Oddly, I haven't found an AAR with the unmitigated Japanese success we've experienced. I am not going to try complete details, especially as its already a month into the war and I don't know them exactly.

I'm playing with a real life friend of mine who got me into WitP. Our first PBEM game had me playing the Allies. In March of '42 I resigned after losing most of my cruisers, 3 US carriers and having sunk ... about 2 CAs. Clark Field still stood, but Manilla had just fallen and Singapore was long gone. I also had a chunk of troops trapped in Rangoon and dying rapidly (two weeks to live, maybe). I firmly believed there was no possible way to prevent him from conquering India. So we started over and switched sides.
As the Allies, I had disgustingly concluded the only possible plan was to run away with everything. He professed that led to inevitable defeat, so I knew I would face resistance playing as Japan.

STRATEGY
That might be good. I don't have one.
The historic plan seems reasonable to me, especially with historic first turn. My only strategic assertions at the beginning (that I would proceed to violate) were to crush Singapore quickly, grab the Oil and ignore the US after pasting Pearl.
The 56th Division from Osaka and the 38th Division from Hong Kong (after taking it) were therefore allocated to Singapore on paper.
The Shinano was canceled.

INITIAL TACTICS
Here I actually came up with something, although two of the three failed.
I wanted to advance weakly in Malaya, sending very little reinforcements to the north. From conversations, I knew the Allies would attempt to delay the advance, buying time in northern Malaya. I figured I'd let him. Then land 2+ divisions and some tanks at Mersing, take Johoru Baru and cut off the northern troops from Singapore.
In the Phillipines, I wanted to hit Lingayen and therefore cut off the divisions outside of Clark, then base airplanes at San Marcelino. Also hit Naga (and north of Naga) to wipe out those divisions.
In China, from reading advice, the plan was to concentrate firepower and crush Changsa. I also went for an end run around the northern side into Lucknow.


INITIAL BATTLES
The KB bombed Pearl Harbor for three days, sinking only the Oklahoma. Lots of ships got pounded and my airplane loses were not too bad, but only the one BB sank.
Wake island fell on the first day.
Invasions at Aparri and Vigan in the Phillipines continued as normal (not entirely in line with the strategic plan already!) with everything going as expected. The silly NLF in the south got crushed, but pulled off the beaches by its transports and returned to Palau. The Japanese naval aviation and navy blasted various transports in the islands, most spectacularly when the destroyers from Hong Kong were caught by a cruiser group near Jolo and blown out of the water.
The invasion at Khota Baru eventually managed to take it. As per plan, the troops landing in the north did very little initially. As walking through that one hex of jungle is hell, the 55th division (headed for Burma) would be moved to Bangkok via transport.

SECOND WEEK (roughly)
Returning to port, I for some reason set two KB Zero squadrons on 100% CAP and forgot about them. By the time they made it to Truk, morale was about 30 and exhaustion up. Even once the KB had refitted its squadrons, those two carriers were left behind to heal their morale and act as a reserve.
The Phillipines proved a total pain in the rear. I could not transport troops in at nearly the speed I desired, making my tactical concept utterly meaningless. I had troops piling up at Vigan because I was afraid to land engineers at San Marcelino without the big troops and I couldn't get the divisions imported fast enough. I cannot even begin to explain, but I basically lost all track of what I was doing other than piling up units. None of this was caused by the allies, it was all self inflicted confusion.
Bombing of Singapore was hurting it and army airplanes began to be based on Khota Baru to aid in the bombing. The AVG showed up in Singapore and shredded a bunch of Oscars. The long range Zeroes (escorting Nells from Saigon) would show up sometimes to beat them down, but my de-facto plan for killing the AVG was mainly to blow them up on the ground using the level bombers. I did not want to 'waste' my elite navy pilots against more difficult fighters. The 33rd and 55th Divisions sitting in Bangkok and papered in for Burma began their (silly) quest for perfect condition (full TOE, no disabled squads).
Hong Kong fell and the 38th Division began refitting. The harbor was cleared in two days thanks to a pre-positioned TF of many many minesweepers. My forces were quietly massing for Changsa at Nanning and Wuhan. Another major group moved one hex west of the rail junction towards Homan, hoping to hold defensively there. Recon planes seemed to confirm the movement of the NE Chinese troops to Yunan, opening the road for the northern end run.

[alfrake]

LATER DECEMBER
Sometime in mid December, two Japanese submarine captains attempted to personally justify the costs of the entire submarine service. The California and Arizona, headed for the west coast to repair, were separately caught and sunk. The Arizona was literally blown out of the water as its weakened armour let a torpedo into its magazines.

The baby carriers (Taiyo, Zuiho, Hosho) finally arrived near Saigon so they could escort transports. The invasion fleet sailed, headed southwest. Keeping up appearances, the northern Malaya forces started attacking occassionally and took Alor Star. Unhappily, transports are slow. The Allied scout planes noticed the huge fleet headed in that direction and the Malaya army retreated rapidly from the north. While the landing at Mersing went well, all the Allied forces made it back to Johoru Baru before it could be taken. My troops settled in for a bit, awaiting the arrival of engineers, artillery and the infantry from the north. There was something of a submarine battle around the landings are Mersing, but the allied subs took more hits than they inflicted and eventually withdrew.
It turned out they merely withdrew into the Singapore docks. Because my carrier Kates were refusing to attack an AK sighted at Singapore, and its presence annoyed me, I set my level bombers to port attack one turn. They blew up six or eight subs instead.

In the Phillipines, things got more sorted out and troops moved into both Manilla and Clark Field. I have made the gesture of attacking each, but really have no interest in spending troops there yet. More reinforcements are due in after the new year.

In China, my Homan blocking force was thrown back by a determined assault. This caused some panic on my part as I weakened the defensive positions around Tatung and Chengting to block the Chinese advance out of Homan. But the Chinese instead chased my troops to Kaifeng, where they threw themselves against prepared defenses with predictable results. The main army advanced into Changsa and achieved 1:1 odds in the first assault, with engineers knocking 1 level off the forts and casualties being nearly equal on both sides. The final third of the AVG showed up in Changsa where they proceeded to shoot up Nates. Despite loses, my level bombers would blow up at about one P-40 on the ground each day and AVG strength dropped slowly. Finally annoyed, I transfered in two Zero squadrons from Taiwan. While they did not achieve massive victories, they shot down enough planes to make the AVG ineffective. Interestingly, my opponent informed me that the total AVG (all three groups) had something like 50 pilots and less than 10 planes at one point. As P-40 production is low, my concept is proving effective, at least in the short term.

Around this time, the US decided to do something. A surface force, escorted by carriers, sailed in and pounded Wake island. Then ran. The high command issued various public threats (phone calls), but completely ignored them in practice. Well, not completely. Naval airpower, no longer required near Singapore and Manilla, reinforced the central pacific over the next few weeks.

[alfrake]

NEW YEAR's VICTORIES
Within a few days of the new year, several important locations fell. Sadly most of the Allied troops escaped Johoru Baru first, only two divisions being forcibly retreated to Singapore. The first assault on Singapore was 0:1, but loses were roughly equal on both sides.
More importantly, Changsa was taken. Repeated deliberate attacks inflicted damage while the engineers reduced the forts, then a shock attack carried the day. The rude Chinese destroyed 599 out of 600 resources centers on the way out however.
The Chinese end run brought the Japanese 15th tank regiment into Lanchow. They kicked out the base force (which blew up most of the good stuff on the way out) and attempted to advance southeast to Kungchang. But a Chinese Division made it just in time and chased the tanks back to Lanchow about Jan 8th.
The Phillipine army, having realized it had no real use for NLFs against Clark Field, began grabbing up all the little islands. The landing at Cebu was a major mistake, but they were pulled back out before they could be crushed. Basically every empty base in the islands was claimed for the Empire.

FISHING FOR CAPITAL SHIPS
As Christmas approached, the KB was ready for another mission. Suspecting significant surface forces still waited in the DEI, that seemed the best target. But sailing carriers in would merely make the capital ships scatter before them and accomplish little. Instead, multiple transport fleets were launched from Palau, with limited escorts (CLs, a couple CAs) or none at all. They hit Menado and Jolo with several SNLFs, and all the bases around Davao with little NLFs. A brigade was also embarked for Tarakan, although it was held back somewhat. The 4 carrier KB sailed several hundred miles behind the transports. As the troops went ashore at Menado and Jolo, the carriers accelerated westward.
The timing was perfect. On about January 1, the KB was several hexes NW of Menado and adjacent to two allied surface action groups ... but covered by a rainstorm. The air cover having failed, my transports had to flee the landing zones for a turn (minor). This also resulted in a sharp surface engagement between destroyer/cruiser forces. While most of the allied ships fled, the KB came out of the rainstorm and hurt the CA Houston and Canberra, plus sinking 4 CLs. As the KB was busy heading down the Makassar Strait, the Ryujo would have to come over and finish a few of them. The entire coast of Borneo from Tarakan north around to Kuching was then rapidly taken by the Japanese.

The KB ran down the Makassar Strait looking to chase surface warships, mainly the British BBs that had been sighted. The escort carriers came south from Singapore to discourage fleeing that direction, but the BBs seemed headed for Darwin. Therefore the Shokaku and Zuikaku, their fighter crews with the morale now restored from weeks of rest, sailed south from Truk. They ran past Rabuul and around New Guinea going west of Port Moresby to close the Torres Strait near Thursday Island. Along the way they picked off a few ships near Port Morseby and shot down a few fighters. TF 1 began to find targets in the Banda Sea, especially as they moved south past Kai Island. A half dozen (or double that) transports were bombed each day, but TF 1 had moved due east of Darwin (6-8 hexes) without finding a warship to bomb. Beginning to doubt my estimate of the enemy location, I figured I had to follow it through anyway. Plus there were at least lots of transports to kill.
But January 10th, apparently realizing the Torres Strait was blocked by more carriers, the British fleet turned around and tried to run past TF 1 in the direction of Darwin. Trying to confuse the issue, the many transports in the area also scattered. They were not successful. The Prince of Wales took 5 torpedos, the Repulse a couple and several other warships were hit. Random small air raids continued to blast transports as well. On January 11th they were bombed again, the Prince of Wales apparently sinking, along with more blasted transports. My ships sunk list shows about 20 transports going down in the area east of Darwin, plus several more killed by the Shokaku and Zuikaku near Port Morseby. I'm fairly confident I also got a couple cruisers and some destroyers. TF 1 is almost out of ammunition, although the detached division is coming west and north with their own ammo supplies to blast more transports.
On January 13th, planes from Shokaku and Zuikaku found the Repulse just outside Darwin harbor. While the many Val bombs were probably useless, the first Kate torpedo detonated the magazine. Repulse sunk. They also killed a destroyer and three more transports.
My only major mistake in this operation was the escort carriers coming south from Singapore got too close to Soerabaja. The random collection of international flying junk launched from 4 hexes away and a Swordfish got through the CAP to put a torpedo into the Hosho. Thank god it was the Hosho and not a real carrier. The Hosho appears likely to survive too.

STRATEGIC ASIDE
Phone conversations have the allies contemplating surrender. He sounds just like I did - all efforts to resist the juggernaut have merely provided opportunities for Japan to gain victory points. India appears totally indefensible. I may resist invading Karachi just because it looks way too easy.

[FeurerKrieg]

Well, it would seem both of your are either really good with Japan or not so good with Allies. Reading through the AARs, as I think you mentioned, you'll see that very few people have attempted conquering India. PZB was the first to successfully do it, and even now it doesn't happen much. Ithink if you stick with the campaign until mid 43, thigns will look quite different. The Japanese will run out of steam, it is just a matter of when and where.