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Yes, I do my utmost to capture Tabiteuea due to its airbase capacity. You're right about leaving most of the two island chains undeveloped - building up airfields on most bases is good news for the allied player. I reckon you really only need 2 mid-sized airfields two provide LBA for the Gilberts and Marshalls. In terms of the islands with large port and airfield capacities, perhaps these should be left as undeveloped as possible but turned into fortresses...

Defending a small island in the CentPac now is nearly pointless; you can't fortify it heavily enough and you can't put a lot of troops on it, and the attacker can always bring in more troops than you've got for a garrison.
 
The better ones to defend are the bigger ones; Makin, Tarawa, etc.  They have essentially unlimited capacity for troops and can upgrade airbases to hold anything you want, and with enough supply can get a very good fortification level.  The little ones are just deathtraps for LCU's.

Well, one thing I have found is that the Allies are woefully short of carrier aircraft replacements in the first four months of the war. I have been fighting for PM, sending reinforcments and hitting enemy shipping and found that this operation alone (4 carriers) has depleted my supply of carrier aircraft. Now KB has shown up around OZ and I don't have strong enough airgroups to contest it. Be very careful until your F4F wildcats and avengers begin to come on line. It is not like WITP at all. Likewise, I don't think I want to risk Betty until I get some better AA upgrades.

ORIGINAL: Termite2

As the Allies, I think Tabiteuea in the Gilberts is critical, I built it up to it's 4 port 6 airbase by march42,

I'm impressed you can build that fast. What do you do? Gather all the Eng in the Pacific and send them there?

This could be a thread about defending the outer perimeter in AE in general; your strategy, as the Empire, will certainly be different than it was in WITP.

I think the "Fortress" strategy is probably now the wisest, IE build one larger island into a signficant base and leave the rest alone. Smaller islands are so vulnerable, best to just leave them undeveloped and undefended.

The good news is though is that the Marshalls and Gilberts are not, in the end, that useful; they will shorten the supply line to Australia, and provide cover for CV forces to lurk, but that's about it. They can't be used to gather troops for more invasions anymore, and aren't going to be effective 4E platforms.

Q-ball,
 
That's not exactly true.  I know Makin at least is large enough to put more than 6000 troops on.  There may be some others bigger than the usual atoll as well.  Those will become prime targets for invasion (and fortress building) since the others are so useless.

ORIGINAL: Beezle

ORIGINAL: Termite2

As the Allies, I think Tabiteuea in the Gilberts is critical, I built it up to it's 4 port 6 airbase by march42,

I'm impressed you can build that fast. What do you do? Gather all the Eng in the Pacific and send them there?

Yes; starting on day1; I sent every navalserv, engineer, construction that I could grab. I protected them with fighters, the Vindicators off of a carrier, Kingfishers and 2- 4 or 5 ship surface fleets. I fully expected the KB to show up, but I believe the gamble is worth it.

I need to think about this. Since the island starts at 0 port IIRC some planning has to go into what to unload 1st (naval support then engineers and supplies, then more engineers and upplies I'd guess).

On dec8th; I take the 804th EAB out of Pearl; 34th cmbt Engr, 111th USN nav base, 47th Const out of SF; Bdet NvServ out of Seattle >all amph. I send the 808th EAB from March to LA for shipment. I send a transport to pickup the 802 EAB at Annette, send the AP from Lahaina to Pearl to pickup the 2nd Cmbt Mar Engr.  I also form 2  Surface fleets out of the Pearl Harbor survivors to guard against possible Japanese surface intercepts. I also load VS1D11 and send it initial air support; to support it, I send any surviving AV, or AVD out of Pearl.