GREAT to have you back!
It's funny, I had checked the forumjust yesterday to see if by any chance I had missed anything and finding it still mute, i was kinda worrying.
welcome back
(and send your carriers to have a raid south-east!)
Hi Annagil. My carriers are pretty busy right now (you'll see eventually) but that's a thought for the future, possibly around the end of the month.
I made a tactical error today. I saw the Allied carriers (at least 2) sitting in the Dutch Harbor hex last turn and sent 2 subs in to try and "get lucky". They got lucky all right. [8|] Allied DDs caught them and sank the I-30 and put a DC on the I-31. The I-31 limped away for repairs and the I-30 is now a fish motel. [:(] I should have placed them to the east of Dutch Harbor in the deep hexes. They could have possibly gotten a shot at something and had deep water to hide in. Stupid!
5 Fleet
The Allies invade Dutch Harbor! Actually, that's not really a surprise. [:(] As I said earlier, Dutch Harbor is nothing more than a speed bump. All I have there are 2x Naval Guard units and an engineer company. After the bombardment by 5BBs, a CA and a CL, the engineer company was gone and there was the equivalent of 1x Naval Guard effective strength. The Allies dropped a US division and some engineers. Half the strength gone and there wasn't even an assault yet. Ouch! (Some speed bump this is going to be. [8|])
China
Remember when I said I shot down all the Chinese A-29s? Well, I lied. Three more showed up next to Ichang and were promptly shot down.
I have an army of ~4300 AV in the north of China that is arriving at Chengting and is switching to strat mode. They will then head down to Changsha and invest that place. Unfortunately, I doubt that I'll be able to surround the base but I'll trash the troops there, which may be even better since they won't be destroyed and thus come back at 1/3 strength. I hope they don't retreat over the river so I can bash them repeatedly. By the way, this is my main army in China, the one that has the 10 heavy artillery units I bought out of Manchuoko.
Burma
We traded an Oscar for 2x Hurricanes.
SE Fleet
Each side lost half a dozen fighters with minor troop damage at Salamaua.
Other Stuff
Reinforcement: AMC Gokoku Maru
The A6M5 advanced to January 1943. I am using 6x30 R&D factories here and expect to get them ~4 Nov 42. The order of priority: KB, MKB, land based daitai. Right now KB and ~half of MKB has the A6M3a with everything else using the A6M2. A6M3a production is 100/month. When the A6M5 becomes operational, the 6x30 factories will upgrade to the A6M5b and the 100 A6M3a factories will upgrade to the A6M5.
Hi Pax! It's good to see you. It's good to be back here. By the way, it looks like I'm going to retire as a MAJ. Our state HQ can't read regulations right. They kept flip flopping. They finally decided not to promote me. No worries. When it appeared that I was going to get promoted, it felt kind of wrong that I would end up at a higher rank than MAJ Dick Winters, after all he did. My career pales in comparison. I'm happy to finish my deployment, retire and then play at war. By the way, I'm less than a year out from retirement! [:D]
The I-169, still patrolling SW of Norfolk Island, caught another convoy and put torpedoes into 2 xAKs in 2 separate attacks. Banzai! Neither ship was reported to have sunk.
5 Fleet
The BB task force bombarded again. [:(] The Allied deliberate assault took the base but both Naval Guards survived......barely.
Burma
A dozen Oscars ambushed an Allied bomber raid killing a Martlet and 2x 2E bombers for no loss. I'll take everything I can get, to make up for my mistakes. (See below.)
SE Fleet
We came out on the winning side over Salamaua today. I lost 5 fighters to 10 of his. His bombers did no damage to my troops.
A Betty daitai went after an Allied task force at Horn Island, losing 12 of 16 planes. [:@]
Hi guys. I can't believe it's been almost a month since I've been here. Things are hopping over here and I'm a planner, so they keep me locked up a lot. [:D] Read the news and you can probably figure it out. Anyway, I've had time to keep the turns rolling but not enough to keep up here too. I just sent Ted the 5 Oct turn. I'm not sure how I'll catch up. I may just do highlights. There have been a couple of exciting events so I'll focus on them. Anyway, here goes...
My subs sting Ted a bit sinking an xAK off Norfolk Island. He still runs ships over there unescorted. I would have figured by now that he has enough escorts to put one or two with each convoy. Apparently not.
I have a sentai of Helens flying out of Rabaul on a nightly bombing mission over Pt. Moresby and another flying out of Hollandia hitting Merauke. Tonight's run over Pt. Moresby destroyed a P-39 and O47A and damaged another dozen on the ground while doing moderate damage to the airfield. The Merauke flight destroyed 6x SBDs on the ground. That's nice since I have an invasion fleet heading there.
In the SE Fleet area, my Tojos took out 5x P-39s for no loss.
In Burma, for the cost of 2x Oscars, 3x Martlets and 7x 2E bombers were shot down.
Relatively quiet day today. Overall losses in the air were 7 Japanese to 6 Allied fighters.
Lunga and Tulagi both reached fort level 4. I'll stop there with that level. Ted typically ignores the Solomons and has done so in this game as well. We'll see what happens.
SE Fleet: 2x Zeros for 2x P-39s. My A6M2 model is rapidly becoming outclassed. Maybe it's because Ted's pilots are beginning to gain some experience. At any rate, I can't wait for the A6M5 to come along, in mid-October.
Burma: 2x Tojos for 4x Brit fighters.
Wessel Island: This was fun to watch. I had a Rufe Chutai in the area providing defensive CAP for quite a while. They had yet to engage in any combat. My invasion fleet went there before sprinting to Merauke. I sent the Rufes there for defensive CAP. 17x SBDs out of Merauke flew unescorted against the fleet and 7 were shot down by the Rufes! I never expected that! Anyway, they planted a bomb on an AMC, but those ships are big and tough. She is able to continue with the fleet.
Reinforcement: 1 RGC Capital Division - RGC Army in China. This is a nice big division that will move to Shanghai to free up a brigade for front line service.
SE Fleet: 2 Japanese fighters vs. 4 Allied fighters. A couple dozen 4E bombers hit Salamaua.
Merauke: The invasion fleet moved 3 hexes NE of Wessel island and was attacked by 8x SBDs escorted by 8x P-40Es. The fleet was covered by 9x Rufes and 40 Zeros (from MKB). All Allied planes were shot down for no Japanese loss or damage! Banzai!
The invasion fleet is prepared to head in tomorrow. They are covered by MKB and KB2 (3 CVs) to the west just outside of SBD range from Merauke and KB1 at Hollandia.
SE Fleet: 6x Oscars vs. 6x P-39s and 3x LB-30s along with moderate damage to Lae's airfield.
Merauke: The invasion force went in today. It was composed of 16 and 20 divisions in a slew of xAKs, xAPs and AMCs with PB escort. Ted had around half a dozen subs in the area and I feared there were mines in Merauke. There was a surface TF lurking to the east, but out of range of my Kates. If they showed up at night, I could be screwed, but if they came during the day, I had about 170 Kates ranged in on Merauke. The Vals legs were too short, so they were doing ASW work around their carriers. I had 54 Zeros providing LRCAP over the invasion force with the majority of the rest either escorting the Kates or protecting the carriers. 54 were providing LRCAP over Merauke. Fingers were crossed.
On the way in, a Dutch sub put a torpedo into an xAP. Ok, I can live with that. Then the S-40 hit an xAK with a dud and took moderate damage in return. I can live with that too. The fleet reached Merauke and began unloading. It turned out the 3 Marine Defense Battalion was there and caused light damage to a number of transports. Some troops landed and then daylight arrived. Guess what? Of 108 Zeros flying LRCAP over the TF and Merauke, none flew! Weather maybe? I'll never know. At any rate, waves of SBDs and Avengers flew against the invasion fleet, primarily from Horn Island. [X(] [:(] When it was all said and done, about 2/3 of the fleet took damage with 5x transports sinking. *Sigh* Ah well, that's life. About 6k troops had landed. Here was the garrison:
6 RAA Coastal Artillery Regiment
2/4 Independent Company
14 NZ Brigade
3 Marine Defense Battalion
308 Engineer Aviation Battalion
5 RAN Base Force
My two divisions, had they landed relatively intact, would have pushed them out with ease. Unfortunately, only 6k landed without much supply and highly disrupted. We'll there's always tomorrow, right?
One of the Kate daitai of KB1 did have secondary orders to hit the port, which they did. They sank all 4 ships there, a PC and 3x AVPs. Wow!
Other Stuff
My 8 surviving Otoris completed their upgrades at Hong Kong. Up to this point in the war, they had no ASW weapons. Now they do. 4 are going to Tokyo for escort duties and the other 4 are headed to Davao for ASW duties.
The 6x Hatsuharus also completed their upgrades at Manila. They'll head back to Davao for escort duties with KB/MKB.
Singapore and Soerabaja's forts both reached level 6.
Merauke: Day 2 of the fiasco. [8|] Well it wasn't just a fiasco for the Japanese side. Ted had his share of stupid commanders too, but not nearly as many as me.
It all started in the wee hours of the morning. Remember that Allied surface fleet I mentioned earlier? Well they arrived and it was composed of 2x CA, 2x CL and a DE. They proceeded to shell the hell out of my battered fleet sinking a PB and 3x transports. Another couple thousand soldiers gone swimming. [8|] Then guess who shows up to the party? Warspite! [X(] She proceeded to watch the the debacle, sit in the hex all day and didn't fire a round! The S-40 was attacked by 2x PBs, who planted a DC on her, along with numerous near misses. They claimed she was sunk, but I doubt it. I'm sure she's headed to the barn though. Then the Dutch sub put a torpedo into an xAP.
Daylight arrived. Waves of Allied SBDs, Avengers and 2E bombers showed up, escorted by P-40s and P-39s. The bombers went after primarily the ground troops. Twelve Japanese fighters were lost vs. 15x Allied fighters. The Allied fighters successfully held off the Japanese fighters from the bombers. Then, something really stupid happened. My invasion fleet decided to head for the hills, abandoning the 6k soldiers to their fate. [8|] Had they stuck around, I most likely would have been able to take Merauke. Well, maybe.
Remember when I said there were some 170 Kates ranged in on Merauke? Well, the cruiser TF had headed for the hills, but Warspite just sat there. Of those 170 Kates, exactly 21 went after Warspite, 13 with torpedoes and 8 with 250 kg bombs. They put 2 torpedoes and 4 bombs into her, and reported her as sunk. Ted later told me he didn't think she'd survive the next day.
To end a wonderful day, that damn Dutch sub sank a PB. [8|] By the end of the day, 7 more transports sank from damage.
What a wonderful operation.
The troops abandoned at Merauke lasted about 3 days. [8|]
The I-26, heading back to Kwajalein from it's patrol off the US west coast, sank an xAK NE of Hawaii.
Merauke: My invasion force straggled to the west (cowards) and an xAP was picked off by Avengers. Ted had every other plane available bombing the troops at Merauke today and some were ambushed by Zeros. For a cost of 4 Zeros, about a dozen enemy planes were shot down.
With the loss of an xAK today from old damage, my pathetic Merauke invasion comes to an end. The remaining ships, all damaged save 1x PB, will make it to Ambon where they will offload the remnants of the 16 and 20 Divisions. They each lost about 50-60% of their strength for absolutely no gain. The 20 division will get shipped to Singapore to rebuild while the 16 division will rebuild at Ambon.
A US fleet sub had been lurking about near Davao so I sent an ASW TF of 4x Shiratsuyus to investigate. The Sculpin put a torpedo into the Suzukaze sinking her outright. [8|] Any more good news out there? That sub will continue to plague me for weeks. Fortunately, she doesn't hit anything else, but I do waste a lot of fuel and depth charges on her over the coming weeks.
Burma: I've begun bombing Akyab and Cox's Bazaar with my bombers in Burma. They need to do something, right? I drastically outnumber Ted in fighters and his 2E bombers are nowhere to be seen. I believe I'm doing a pretty good job of keeping the RAF suppressed. Total losses today were 1 bomber to 3 enemy fighters along with heavy damage to Akyab's air field. I'm moving a large army to the hex NE of Akyab to push out the Allied rabble there and cut off Akyab once more. I want to keep him reacting to me.
SE Fleet: There was a nice little ambush today. 14x Oscars caught 16x Avengers in a bombing raid over Salamaua, shooting down 13 of the bombers for no loss. Ted made a few choice comments about Marine pilots. [:D]
Other Stuff
The A6M5 research advanced to 12/42! I have 6x 30 factories working this line. When they become operational (some time in mid-October), those factories will begin work on the A6M5b and the 100 A6M3a and 30 A6M2-N factories will upgrade to the A6M5. Can't wait!
Reinforcement: xAK Hachijin Maru (Std-C) - will convert to TK.
I still don't have enough enough TKs hauling fuel/oil out of the Singapore/Palembang/Medan/Bengkalis complex. That area is up to ~500k points of fuel and oil. I had 8x 11.6k TKs accelerated with about half completed and the remaining TKs to be completed within a month. That should help.
Quiet day. The only action was in Burma, and not much there either. A couple of Martlets were shot down and 113 Japanese 2E bombers trashed Akyab's airfield.
In Burma, I have mainly Helen IIas, along with a sentai of Sally IIa, and about a dozen Lily IIa. Eventually, everything in the front line will be equipped with the Helen. The Lilys will go away and the Sallies will be used either as ASW or in China.
