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ORIGINAL: JonReb

This has been a really fun read, I'm especially enjoying the drive thru to the Philippines, you're making excellent headway!

Lurking from afar

Jon

Hey Jon.

Thank you. I´m glad you are enjoying the read. [:)]

8th September -44

Mindanao area
Not much to report. The newly landed artillery and armor moves out from Cotabato towards Cagayan. Erik has moved some combat ships to Balabac (see screenshot). Probably a defensive mission covering a troop landing at said base. I don´t have the means to do anything about this yet.

Cotabato airfield reaches 8.89. Next turn the bomber hive moves in. In preparation I have moved 2000 AS to Cotabato. This will be my main airbase for quite some time. First job is to reduce Eriks troops on Jolo to rubble!

I did some sweeps in the area to get a feel of Eriks determination. Forgot to chance altitude on 2 of the Corsair squadrons and paid the price for it. [:(] One 7 kill ace lost but 3 new gained.

DEI
No opposition. BFs are onshore with a radar set. Started expanding the level 4 AF. Erik has moved some BBs and CAs within striking range again. Only PTs will face them for now.

Burma
Finally the bombers took off! My sweeps rained in though but luckily Erik had given up trying to cover his troops after yesterdays sweeps. This is what Allied bombers do to troops in the open in 44!

923 casualties reported
Squads: 2 destroyed, 50 disabled
Non Combat: 6 destroyed, 83 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 5 disabled
Vehicles lost 6 (2 destroyed, 4 disabled)

918 casualties reported
Squads: 2 destroyed, 29 disabled
Non Combat: 6 destroyed, 106 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 3 disabled
Vehicles lost 28 (3 destroyed, 25 disabled)

179 casualties reported
Squads: 2 destroyed, 4 disabled
Non Combat: 1 destroyed, 9 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled

343 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 12 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 24 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 1 disabled

140 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled
Non Combat: 1 destroyed, 28 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled

59 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 2 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 6 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled

109 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 8 disabled
Non Combat: 1 destroyed, 3 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled

145 casualties reported
Squads: 1 destroyed, 6 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 6 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled

117 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled
Non Combat: 1 destroyed, 31 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled

34 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled
Non Combat: 2 destroyed, 14 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled
Vehicles lost 8 (2 destroyed, 6 disabled)

179 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled
Non Combat: 2 destroyed, 44 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled

69 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 22 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled

27 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 13 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled

20 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 4 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled

96 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 5 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 5 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 1 disabled

126 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 5 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 11 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled

96 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 7 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 5 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled
Vehicles lost 2 (1 destroyed, 1 disabled)

Vehicles lost 11 (1 destroyed, 10 disabled)

56 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 3 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 2 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled

168 casualties reported
Squads: 1 destroyed, 9 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 3 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled

106 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 5 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 5 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled
Vehicles lost 1 (1 destroyed, 0 disabled)

66 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 2 disabled
Non Combat: 2 destroyed, 2 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled

19 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 1 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 1 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled

105 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 4 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 7 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled

70 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 5 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 3 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled

76 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 2 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 5 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 2 disabled

82 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 5 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 1 disabled

52 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 4 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 2 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled

111 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 10 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 3 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled

74 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 8 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled

100 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 8 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 2 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 1 disabled

55 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled
Non Combat: 1 destroyed, 16 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled

Quite happy with that obviously! [:D] Hoping for more tomorrow...some of my armor managed to get into the hex this turn. Only 600 AV though but I decided to risk an attack. Hopefully Eriks troops are so disrupted after the bombings I won´t cripple myself. There is also a chance Erik will have time to move out since my strikes rained in yesterday. I´ll know tonight. Switched one of the Command HQs to Pegu. 25 prep now on Pegu.

The coming week will decide the future of South East Asia. If I can defeat Erik around Pegu the road is wide open to Thailand and Malaysia. Erik has nothing but small brigades and BFs in the area. I´m counting 30.000 troops in Thailand. Thats it! Will try not to get my hopes up though...

Hmmm

Ideas on what this can be...? Is he actually going to try naval bombarding Cotabato? I have 5 PT TFs and two Fletcher ones. No mines. No important shipping besides a big Cargo TF.

Trying to bombard makes no sense at all. But thats the only thing I can think of. [&:][&:][&:]

Ideas?

If there really are CVs/CVEs in those TFs, he is probably hoping to sink a reinforcement convoy full of troops.

Why are you not sure about the bombardment of Cotabato? It makes a lot of sense since he does not want it to get to level 9 and it seems to be your only air base in the area?

ORIGINAL: BBfanboy

If there really are CVs/CVEs in those TFs, he is probably hoping to sink a reinforcement convoy full of troops.

Why are you not sure about the bombardment of Cotabato? It makes a lot of sense since he does not want it to get to level 9 and it seems to be your only air base in the area?

I´m not so sure about the CVs/CVEs being on a strike mission. Its too close to Cotabato so any strike would risk hitting the Cotabato CAP (400 fighters). I´m thinking they are purely there for CAP. Sounds reasonable?

What I mean about bombarding Cotabato making no sense is that it has gone from level 1 to 9 (hit 9 this turn! [&o])in 20 days. So Erik must know I have an insane number of engineers there. So even if he managed to close it he can never keep it closed. Had he done this when it was level 3-4 it would have made more sense. Now its just too late.

I think I will do the following. There is no need for me to take any unnecessary risks. I´m going to fly out everything valuable (P47s/Corsairs/Spits) and send the 2 CLs to Morotai. The Fletchers and PTs will stay. Taking on 50 PT boats and 22 Fletchers at night with only 50% moonlight with BBs...Not something I would like to try.

I´ll also fly in every TB and DB I have in the area and fly in some 200 Hellcats and other expendable AC and set it on naval strike. If the base gets nuked I´ve not lost anything I´ll miss. If he does bombard and it fizzles...well it could be interesting! [:)]

He must know how incredibly risky it would be to bombard Cotabato even without your capital ships involved. And for what? At best he'll destroy some planes on the ground, but the pilots will live on.

At this stage of the war, from my POV, Japan should be looking almost solely at defense, well-timed counter attacks, and harassment-- whatever can reasonably cause the most damage per second and put some wrenches in the Allied war cogs. It'd be foolhardy to attempt to blockade or damage your current beachhead, especially so late as you mentioned. Maybe he doesn't want to play to your tune and is trying to draw you into another naval battle where the odds favor him? That requires a reaction on your part of course. He's already starting to miss quite a lot of critical mass but extra LBA can sometimes do the job.

Or it's all a feint. Keep your eyes on San Francisco!

ORIGINAL: JonReb

He must know how incredibly risky it would be to bombard Cotabato even without your capital ships involved. And for what? At best he'll destroy some planes on the ground, but the pilots will live on.

At this stage of the war, from my POV, Japan should be looking almost solely at defense, well-timed counter attacks, and harassment-- whatever can reasonably cause the most damage per second and put some wrenches in the Allied war cogs. It'd be foolhardy to attempt to blockade or damage your current beachhead, especially so late as you mentioned. Maybe he doesn't want to play to your tune and is trying to draw you into another naval battle where the odds favor him? That requires a reaction on your part of course. He's already starting to miss quite a lot of critical mass but extra LBA can sometimes do the job.

Or it's all a feint. Keep your eyes on San Francisco!

Thats exactly my thinking too. But Erik has been very aggressive in past so it wouldn´t surprise me too much if he went for it.

You know what. You might be right with your second part. Hadn´t crossed my mind! [X(] It actually makes a lot more sense for him to try and draw me to another CV battle at this point then bombarding Cotabato. That would explain the 500 bombers around Manilla too...could be a very elaborate trap indeed! But as you say that requires me to react and I won´t! [:D]

AKAGI

Bah, not too unexpected I just got confirmation she wasn´t sunk. [:(] I guess she will be out of action for quite some time though.

9th September -44

Besides the CV/BB combo moving into the Sulu sea we had a big air battle in Burma.

Burma
Not the day I had hoped. It all begins great with my sweeps crashing into a VERY big LRCAP.

Japanese aircraft
A6M3a Zero x 10
A6M5 Zero x 8
A6M5b Zero x 4
N1K1-J George x 13
N1K2-J George x 33
Ki-43-IIIa Oscar x 99
Ki-45 KAIa Nick x 36
Ki-61-II KAI Tony x 6
Ki-84a Frank x 69

These are worn down with little loss during the AM phase. Interesting to see so many Oscars. I wonder if Erik hasn´t recovered his prime air frames yet. Unfortunately the bombers doesn´t go in until the PM phase and by then Erik has some LRCAP up again. Not as big but still very sizable.

A6M3a Zero x 7
A6M5 Zero x 5
A6M5b Zero x 4
N1K1-J George x 10
N1K2-J George x 25
Ki-43-IIIa Oscar x 60
Ki-45 KAIa Nick x 23
Ki-61-II KAI Tony x 4
Ki-84a Frank x 44

I of course suffers a bit but not too badly. If it wasn´t for the RAF... I have no idea how they can continuously suffer 80% of the losses while only constituting 10% of the force. [:(] RAF 4E pools are now critical after some 30 are lost after OPS are counted. On the plus side I only suffer 1 ace KIA (6 kills), 1 WIA (8 kills) and one MIA (5 kills). I gain 12 new aces and 1 double ace! [:'(]

My armor also make the deliberate attack. By the looks of it Erik force is pretty hammered. My losses look worse than they are. The numbers are off in the report as the only units actually in the attack are 4 armoured units. The others popped into the hex the same turn and for some reason showed up in the report. Erik raw AV is halved! [X(]

Ground combat at 56,52 (near Pegu)

Allied Deliberate attack

Attacking force 13140 troops, 278 guns, 1028 vehicles, Assault Value = 6451

Defending force 83230 troops, 1163 guns, 757 vehicles, Assault Value = 2444

Allied adjusted assault: 230

Japanese adjusted defense: 1122

Allied assault odds: 1 to 4

Combat modifiers
Defender: disruption(-), supply(-)
Attacker:

Japanese ground losses:
1408 casualties reported
Squads: 8 destroyed, 95 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 17 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 11 disabled
Guns lost 40 (10 destroyed, 30 disabled)

Allied ground losses:
361 casualties reported
Squads: 15 destroyed, 52 disabled
Non Combat: 5 destroyed, 50 disabled
Engineers: 2 destroyed, 17 disabled
Guns lost 35 (5 destroyed, 30 disabled)
Vehicles lost 146 (13 destroyed, 133 disabled)

If his troops doesn´t manage to leave the hex next turn it will be a carnage. But I´m 99% sure he will reach Pegu before I can attack. His other stack reached Rangoon this turn. I don´t think they will hang around but will join the "eastern stack" at Pegu. He has to or risk being cut off. Forts or no forts I will make an all out attack at Pegu with my full stack (now 8000 AV) as soon as they arrive at Pegu. I will never get a chance to hit him in the open again. Make or break.

I asked Erik to upload the replay in case he didn´t have time to do the turn. Sadly no replay, turn or word from Erik. So I´m still in the dark about Cotabato and if I managed to get to his troops in China.

Airwar
While things were very dire just some six months ago they have really brightened up despite very heavy combat with the SWPAC/SOPAC advance. Eriks withdrawal over Burma and everywhere else have given my pools time to recover. The current score is 25699 Japanese planes for 14505 allied. My scheme to use green pilots (50/70/70) in expendable airframes (P38/Hellcats) has increased my losses a bit. But I feel its worth it as its putting a toll on Erik and giving me a very healthy pool of fantastic pilots. As I gain aces in the green squadrons I phase them out replacing them with green pilots.

There are some concerns still lingering though. The RAF 4E pool is a disaster after the last turn losses. Same with the B29 pool with only 18 spare planes. Corsair pool is also really low but that because I have taken the luxury of upgrading most CV squadrons to Corsairs to make up for the recent losses in CVEs. If in a pickle I can always downgrade some squadrons to Hellcats which are plentiful.

US Army fighter pool is looking decent. I´m still on target with the P47 losses. P38 pool is looking really good with over 200 replacements. The P38 is feeling a bit outdated now though and is taking quite heavy losses.

British fighterpool is fantastic. 200 Spit VII and 100 Thunderbolt! [X(] Wish they wern´t stuck with the crappy 16 plane squadrons and I had more squadrons.

Pilotspools are also in great shape with 2 exceptions. USN TB trained pilots are in really shortage and so is USAAF bomber GRND trained ones. I hope to remedy this by the time 44 is up.

Attached a screen of the top pilots down to the double aces. [:)]

Naval losses

Good luck in Burma. Will be massive if you can breakthrough here and storm down into Indo-China....good to see the progress you're making into Mindanao as well. A very nicely conducted campaign[:)]

Thank you Speedy! [:)] I did manage to maul two of his divisions and most of his arty before they reached Pegu! Could be significant for the battle of Pegu!

Burma into Thailand - Why don't I see troops in your screenshot moving down from Taung Gyi into Thailand to threaten Chiang Mai?

ORIGINAL: ny59giants

Burma into Thailand - Why don't I see troops in your screenshot moving down from Taung Gyi into Thailand to threaten Chiang Mai?

Because I´m "superstacking" at Pegu. [:)] I want all my available AV at there. Besides it would take a month moving to Chiang Mai and with the rail there Erik can easily reinforce while mine would take a months or more to get there. Its to easy to block me there basically. [:)]

10th of September

Okey, I´m kicking myself here. Partly because I didn´t foresee what Erik was doing and partly because that man has more luck then the devil...[:@]

Celebes Sea
Erik sent the KB into the Celebes Sea. [X(] Nothing goes for Cotabato. This caught me really off guard and I loose a some 50 ([X(]) ships and 2 OZ engineer units. Also most of the support for 93rd ID went down in one of the convoys. The big Cargo TF that departed Cotabato didn´t make it and some 120.000 supply is lost together with some 20 xAKs.

This is not the first time Erik goes up against LBA with the KB and yet again he gets away without a scratch. Despite having a really piss poor CAP up of only 55 fighters they manage to shoot down 150 TBs, 50 DBs and 50 Hellcats for almost no own losses. [8|] In the last attack only 9 fighters were still airborne but they still manages to shoot down 26 Helldivers. [8|] So nothing new here... [8|] I keep telling me his luck has to run out sometime but it never does.

So after raging for a few minutes I take a look at the turn file and take a few deep breaths. When assessing the situation a bit more objectively I realise all this doesn´t matter much. I won´t miss the shipping or the troops. The only thing I will really miss are the TB pilots. So basically Erik didn´t achieve much besides giving away three important things:
-The location of the KB
-The fact that he knows where my CVs are. Or think he does...
-The KB is quite severely weakened judging by the strikes and I can easily take it on with what I currently have available.

-Knowing the location of the KB gives me the opportunity to launch a little surprise OP I have had brewing for a while. More on that later.
-I have been keeping a really close eye on my CV TFs and Sarmi and have not had any rise in DL. I think Erik might have made a mistake here. About a week ago he spotted my cripple CVE TF heading to Sydney for repairs. Could it be that he thought this was my CV fleet?

The biggest problem I have to face now is I´m short about 100 TB pilots. Since most of the TB planes were flown off my CVE fleet its now severely reduced in striking power until I can make up the losses. Not good and I have no clear solution on this right now.

Burma
Some better news here though. Erik didn´t manage to get everything out in time. Two IDs are severely mauled and most of his artillery will be out of action for a very long time. They certainly won´t be able to take part in the coming battle of Pegu! [&o]

Ground combat at 56,52 (near Pegu)

Allied Deliberate attack

Attacking force 152906 troops, 3118 guns, 2739 vehicles, Assault Value = 8154

Defending force 26288 troops, 459 guns, 219 vehicles, Assault Value = 829

Allied adjusted assault: 4284

Japanese adjusted defense: 142

Allied assault odds: 30 to 1

Combat modifiers
Defender: disruption(-), supply(-)
Attacker:

Japanese ground losses:
12987 casualties reported
Squads: 632 destroyed, 62 disabled
Non Combat: 449 destroyed, 227 disabled
Engineers: 90 destroyed, 28 disabled
Guns lost 386 (344 destroyed, 42 disabled)
Vehicles lost 145 (106 destroyed, 39 disabled)
Units retreated 3
Units destroyed 3

Allied ground losses:
870 casualties reported
Squads: 2 destroyed, 133 disabled
Non Combat: 1 destroyed, 32 disabled
Engineers: 1 destroyed, 16 disabled
Guns lost 40 (2 destroyed, 38 disabled)
Vehicles lost 36 (5 destroyed, 31 disabled)

Defeated Japanese Units Retreating!

Assaulting units:
Provisionl Tank Brigade
5th Indian Division
6th Australian Division
36th Indian Division
41st Infantry Division
268th Motorised Brigade
18th British Division
50th Tank Brigade
20th Indian Division
IV Corps Engineer Battalion
27th Infantry Division
17th Indian Division
7th Indian Division
7th Infantry Division
255th Indian Tank Brigade
I Aus Corps Engineer Battalion
475th USA Regiment
209th Combat Engineer Battalion
2nd British Division
43rd Infantry Division
254th Armoured Brigade
11th (East African) Division
1st New Chinese Corps
XV Corps Engineer Battalion
9th Australian Division
2/11th Field Regiment
23rd AA Bde
XV Indian Corps
30th Indian Mountain Gun Regiment
2/13th Field Regiment
1st Indian Light AA Regiment
101st Heavy AA Regiment
2/9th Field Regiment
Southeast Asia
25th Indian Mountain Gun Regiment
6th Mixed A/T Mtr Regiment
85th British AT Gun Regiment
118th Light AA Regiment
163rd Light AA Regiment
15th Indian Heavy AA Regiment
23rd Indian Mountain Gun Regiment
2nd Indian Heavy AA Regiment
6th Medium Regiment
8th Medium Regiment
IV Indian Corps
24th Indian Mountain Gun Regiment
31st Indian Mountain Gun Regiment
17th Indian Light AA Regiment
III Indian Corps
12th Indian Heavy AA Regiment
225 Group RAF
33rd Indian Mountain Gun Regiment
14th Army
8th Mahratta AT Gun Regiment
1st West African AA Regiment

Defending units:
9th Division
38th Division
49th AA Machinecannon Company
1st Hvy.Artillery Regiment
50th Field AA Battalion
4th Ind.Hvy.Art. Battalion
39th Field AA Battalion
69th Field AA Battalion
1st Air Defense AA Regiment
40th Field AA Battalion
9th Ind.Hvy.Art. Battalion
2nd Mortar Battalion
9th RF Gun Battalion

This got to hurt for him. He lost a crapload of Arty and AA here hopefully giving my bombers a even greater impact at Pegu starting tomorrow. His "Western stack" will probably reach Pegu tomorrow adding another 2500 AV to his total numbers. I estimate he total AV at Pegu will be around 4000 against my 8000. Forts will be decisive.

Question
How many days will it approximately take for him to move out of the Pegu hex across the river towards Moulmain in combat mode? I would love for my own "western stack" to catch up with its 5500 AV but I doubt that's possible. Erik will probably leave some troops for slaughter at Rangoon to halt me for a turn.

While happy about the events in Burma the events in the Celebes Sea leaves a sour taste in my mouth. I will have to try and turn this into my advantage so the losses wasn´t in vain. [:(]

Black day in the Celebes Sea
I just did a quick count. I lost 73 (crikey!) ships from 1 point LCIs up to 8 point xAP for a total of 475 VP. The Engineers and support troops lost was worth about 270 more VPs. Not a good day at all. [:(]

That sucks Joc.

Burma looks good though.

Ouch indeed. The fun part of being Japan I guess is these small victories. Know what you mean though. I'd be very miffed and frustrated. More so at myself for not spotting it. I mean we have to have the all seeing eye right?[;)]

Indeed! Sadly my all seeing eye was broken yesterday it seems! [:D]

Have to hand it to Erik though. I was a really, really nice move. Hats off to him. The thought he would move into the Celebes never crossed my mind. As so many times before it could have ended a lot worse for me so I won´t complain too much. And in the big scheme of things losing a bunch of LCI/LSTs/xAKs doesn´t matter at this stage for the allies. Everything lost (besides the TB pilots) are easily replaced. Now I just have to try and use this new found knowledge of the KB location to best effect.

He lost virtually no KB planes so he might hang around. I´m going to move my CVs forward and fill out the lost CVE strike planes with USMC DBs. If he hangs around I might catch up in two days.


Erik sent me a mail expressing some thought on the power of ground bombing in Burma. I think the word he used were "crap"! [:D] He mentioned that I was able to do in Burma in a day took him a month in China. I told him that's not how I remembered it since he caused around 1000 losses each day for 6 months time regardless of terrain using a fraction of the bombload I´m using in Burma. So I wasn't generally too sympathetic towards his plight! But it did make me feel a little better! [:D]