The Shipwreck of Their Hopes: Good'Guyz (aka "The Allies")

[Nomad]

We are now up to Feb 17th, 1942. Still little to report from the CBI, but the enemy continues to advance in Miller41s area. Pago Pago fell to the ever advancing evil empire today and they are pushing toward Townsville in Australia.

Air attacks on Townsville:
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Morning Air attack on Townsville , at 92,144

Weather in hex: Partial cloud

Raid spotted at 25 NM, estimated altitude 24,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 8 minutes

Japanese aircraft
A6M2 Zero x 30
Ki-43-Ic Oscar x 21



Allied aircraft
P-40E Warhawk x 13


No Japanese losses

Allied aircraft losses
P-40E Warhawk: 5 destroyed



Aircraft Attacking:
30 x A6M2 Zero sweeping at 19000 feet
10 x Ki-43-Ic Oscar sweeping at 17000 feet

CAP engaged:
13rd PS (P) with P-40E Warhawk (0 airborne, 9 on standby, 0 scrambling)
9 plane(s) intercepting now.
0 plane(s) not yet engaged, 0 being recalled, 4 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 10000 , scrambling fighters to 10000.
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 30 minutes



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Morning Air attack on Townsville , at 92,144

Weather in hex: Partial cloud

Raid spotted at 46 NM, estimated altitude 20,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 15 minutes

Japanese aircraft
A6M2 Zero x 6
Ki-43-Ic Oscar x 11



No Japanese losses



Aircraft Attacking:
6 x A6M2 Zero sweeping at 15000 feet
11 x Ki-43-Ic Oscar sweeping at 17000 feet

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Morning Air attack on Townsville , at 92,144

Weather in hex: Partial cloud

Raid spotted at 45 NM, estimated altitude 7,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 14 minutes

Japanese aircraft
Ki-43-Ic Oscar x 11
Ki-48-Ib Lily x 11



Japanese aircraft losses
Ki-48-Ib Lily: 1 damaged



Port hits 1
Port supply hits 1

Aircraft Attacking:
11 x Ki-48-Ib Lily bombing from 7000 feet *
Port Attack: 2 x 100 kg GP Bomb
11 x Ki-43-Ic Oscar sweeping at 17000 feet

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Here is a picture of the South Pacific. It is not pretty( for AFBs at least )

[Nomad]

I'm sure that most of you know that the Allies have suffered a huge Naval loss. A large multiday CV battle has resulted in 5 USN CVs sunk for possibly 3 Japanese CVs. The details are probably best viewed in our opponents thread where I hope they are experiencing some victory disease. It will be a long time before the USN is able to rebuild itself and go on the offensive. More on that in coming days.

I am now looking at the possible areas of attack the Japanese could take and what I think the risks and rewards are.

Starting in the North and moving clockwise.

1. Aleutian Islands and Alaska: there is not much protecting this area, but there are no real rewards either. They could restrict USN movement from Northern WC ports, but they would be using Naval Forces that were stationed very far from their fuel producing bases. I don't think this is much of a threat.

2. Hawaiian Islands and/or West Coast. Again, not much benefit from taking the Hawaiian Islands and it would be expensive for them. Attacking the West Coast does release a host of reserve UNA units. Not too likely they would go that direction.

3. New Zealand. This would cut the on map communication from the WC bases and Australia. But, there is an alternative route through Cape Town. There are no resources, oil, or HI here to provide any real economic reason for an attack in this direction.

4. Australia. They have landed in the North of Australia and in the North East, but I see no evidence of them landing large forces. I think they are either using the attack on Australia as a feint, or just trying to push the Allies back so the road back is even longer. There are some HI, resources and small amounts of oil available in Australia to provide some economic incentive for an attempt to take all of Australia. But as they attack into the Southeast corner they will activate some troops that might provide some stiff resistance. The Australian HI is reasonably near the DEI refineries, so this direction is a valid attack possibility. Ken Miller will have to try and keep Australia from falling completely if it is the direction they take.

5. India. This is my nightmare scenario. There are loads of HI, LI, resources, and small amounts of oil to make India a viable economic target. It is also near the DEI refineries that can keep the HI producing for a good long time. India has a huge coastline. They can cover one or two invasion locations with what CVs they have available. I have at most 4000AV available in India. And much if it is not very well trained and have low morale. I am moving most of my large forces back away from the coast and Burma. I will have to trade a lot of territory for time. If they try to take all of India I will be forced to abandon much of the country and try and hold out in the Karachi area. I can probably move reinforcements from Aden to Karachi with some losses. If they do invade in force I want to have them trip the Indian invasion reinforcements.

6. China. I thought that we were supposed to be playing a quiet China by house rule. I have edit out some critical remarks about our opponents that were untrue. My partner put in an email that China was quiet and either he misunderstood or I did. Just bad communications between me any my partner Again, there is not that much industry, oil, or resources to make China a real viable target. And, they can continue to attack without involving the Navy and the forces belonging to Southern Army HQ.

7. Russia. I don't think they will try that way. The extra strength in the mod is in Naval power and they will want to utilize that.

The bottom line is that I think India could be the next large target they take on. They have enough naval power to cover the invasions. they have the ground troops now that the DEI has been taken and they will have more as soon as Bataan falls. Since the USN is in disarray they can hold most of the islands in the South Pacific with Naval Guard units and even extent their territory. I will try to prepare the best I can and see what happens.

[Nomad]

I think I have my partner back into the game. We are trying to piece together something. I am sending the British CV and CVL that I have now to the South Pacific. He has one CV and another due in 32 days. If they do send most of KB to the West side of the board Miller41 should be able to inflict some losses and possibly take back an important island. If they move back to the east to protect it I have some sizable surface combat units in Abadan and Cape Town.

I am trying to sort out my combat units. I have all but 5 of the Indian units converted to Indian 42 squads. I will be trying to free up artillery and tanks next to fill out my units. India is very lightly garrisoned at this time. This might all be a useless enterprise, but better to be prepared than not. My partner does not think they will attack India, but I see it as a location that has resources, LI and HI that they can use for a while. They have fuel at Rangoon to power the HI in the Bengal region. Not to mention they will be looking to destroy units. The one thing I will be very careful about is to not get them trapped. Even if they are shattered, if I can save partial units and not lose India I can rebuild over time and return the favor later. One thing that will hurt some is that the first commander changed a number of units planning location. They are at about 50-60 planning now but they have not had any experience upgrades so they are going to be very weak for another few months.

[DTurtle]

The house rules were posted on page 3 of this thread. I didn't see anything in this thread about changing any of them, so they should still be valid.

There was talk of a one month truce in China at the beginning of the game, I guess that is where the misunderstanding came from.

[font="times new roman"]HR [/font] 
[font="times new roman"]1.  1st turn can have multiple port attacks, but ONLY from carriers.  Manila and Singapore may have Fighters up and on CAP.  Cannot transfer new Squadrons reflecting prior knowledge. [/font] 
[font="times new roman"]2.  PPs to move out of national borders (Japan - Manchuria, Thai) and (Allies - India, China)  [/font] 
[font="times new roman"]3.  No strategic bombing (Oil, Resources, HI, LI, etc.) until July 1943 [/font] 
[font="times new roman"]4.  Manila subs can form TF based on a date/time stamp (use the last digit in a pre-determined e-mail). Since this may be the second port attack, the last digit in the time (hh:mm:ss) is used to determine how many subs can form TF   [/font] 
[font="times new roman"]5.  Japan will follow restrictions Juan suggests on conversions:  Japan should only have two BB or CVL conversions at any one time, and four CA or CVE conversion at any one time.[/font] 
[font="times new roman"]6.  Non-historic 1st turn, +/- 60 day reinforcement, PDUs ON, orders for TF formed already [/font] 
[font="times new roman"]7.  Offensive operations in jungle and mountain hexes on the Burmese front should be stopped from early-June to early-December, allowing R&R and unit rotations, and give both players on the front a much less bloody (and much more interesting) experience. This would mean: 
 
- No deliberate or shock attack in the jungle hexagones in the designated area 
- Bombardment attacks are still allowed 
- Movement into friendly or empty hexs are still allowed 
- No offensive air ops from or against the Burmese front hexagones (recon still allowed) 
- No offensive carrier operations in the Gulf of Bengal against Burma (other naval ops, including bombardment, are still allowed). Striking either Bengal, Northern India or Malaya from carriers in the Gulf is still allowed, of course. 
 
Hexagones would be corresponding to everything above the "Thailand" label within Burmese and Thailandese borders + the few jungle hexagones going 3 or 4 hexagones into "India" (Kohima, Ledo, Imphal area) [/font] 
[font="times new roman"]8.  Night Bombing must have 50% Moonlight through the end of 1943.  Starting January 1, 1944 Night Bombing may occur in any condition. [/font] 
[font="times new roman"]9.  Aircraft Limitations:[/font] [font="times new roman"]a.  TB2D-1 Skypirate and FD-1 Phantom should only operate from land bases or Midway class CVBs. 
 
b.  A7M Sam and B7A/-D Grace should not be operated from Japanese CVE's. 
[/font] [font="times new roman"]c.  [/font][font="times new roman"]Combat altitude could be fighters only from:[/font] [font="times new roman"]Dec 1941- May 1942   20,000 [/font] [font="times new roman"]June 1942-Dec 1942  25,000[/font] [font="times new roman"]1943    28,000[/font] [font="times new roman"]1944    31,000[/font] [font="times new roman"]1945    Whatever[/font] 
[font="times new roman"]All other Aircraft below 20k (except Recon) [/font] 
[font="times new roman"]10.  Four-Engine Bombers:[/font] [font="times new roman"]a.  4e bombers restricted to 10k or higher for naval attacks (does not include PBY/Mavis type patrol craft)[/font] 
[font="times new roman"]b.  4e bombers CANNOT bomb troops

[/font]

[Nomad]

I found them earlier, finally. For some reason I did not put a copy of them where I normally would. Plus I kept thinking that I never got them. John sent them to me in an email as an attachment and I think I missed it. to be honest I never went back and read this thread. It seems my partner told me that China was to be quiet. I'm not sure if he meant the cease fire or what. Anyway I have moved on and will now run the combat replays and see what is happening. I haven't been watching them, just doing my small part of the turn.

[Nemo121]

I'm sure that most of you know that the Allies have suffered a huge Naval loss. A large multiday CV battle has resulted in 5 USN CVs sunk for possibly 3 Japanese CVs.

Is this really such a significant loss? Sure it would have been better if you could have not lost those CVs BUT for the IJN losing 3 CVs means achieving the turn-over point at which point in time the Allies gain naval CV superiority all the sooner. This appears to be helped in this mod by the increased rate of Allied replacements.

Have you actually sat down and charted the number of Allied and Japanese CVs available to each side assuming no losses? I think you should do that and then generate a list taking into account these losses + Allied respawns ( which are probably disabled in this mod ) + maximal Japanese and Allied conversion of merchants to CVEs and CAs etc to CVLs.


Only when you do that will you have the necessary information to craft a long-term strategic assessment of the impact of these losses on your current situation and begin to be able to craft a plan to counter the effect of these losses.


In my game vs Mike I am very much inferior in terms of carriers and CV-based plane numbers and experience yet I'm able to force cause enough trouble in the Pacific, DEI and China to really mess with his timetables. I have no doubt that in this game if you really look at each of the theatres you will find many areas in which the Japanese are over-extended and can be hit along their SLOCs at minimal cost. Unfortunately with the loss of the CVs this will be more difficult. It appears you decided to go up against the spearpoint instead of hacking off the hands holding the spear, an immeasurably easier proposition. Still, even without your CVs ( which would have made excellent SLOC raiders ) you can still raid the SLOCs and interdict bases, tieing down many IJN light combatants as escorts and, indirectly, increasing the losses of the IJN spearpoint as it is robbed of the necessary escorts.

[Nemo121]

Also, your opponents have changed. Michael has left and been replaced. Have you found out how they have redivided their areas of responsibility. With Michael in control of the DEI I would have said India was utterly safe but with Michael now gone and John3rd the senior partner in the other 2 x 2 side all bets are off the table again so a re-evaluation is in order.

Have you determined if they've changed the division of responsibilities?

[vettim89]

Unfortunate about your CV losses but this is a enhanced Japan mod: they are supposed to be kicking your cans all over map at this point. John3 is one of the most aggressive JFB out there; so this aggresive land grab is no surprise. You just need to weather the storm and then slowly start rataking territory. One thing I thought was that the Japanese were supposed to be more limited as far as lift in AE. I guess this massive land grab puts that thought to bed. I don't think there was any manipulation of the merchant shipping in this mod was there?

[Nomad]

Honesty compels me Nemo121 to tell you that I have left that mostly to my partner. I only took on the CBI portion because I know how much he hates it. I do have a good idea of the relative strengths over time( I am playing this mod as the Japanese agains miller41 ). MY immediate concern is what will happen in India in the next 4 - 8 weeks. Given that they lost 3 CVs and have one damaged and one CVL damaged, they should be able to field 4 CVs with the possibility that 1 more could be available in the near future along with 3-5CVLs of varying sizes ( 36 - 60 ). I have sent the British CV and CVL available with a BB to the South Pacific. If I am right they should arrive and be able to rendezvous with the two USN CVs available in about 5 weeks. If they do commit more than 3 CVs and 2 CVLs to cover attacks India, then I expect my partner to attack and take one of the three major islands in the South Pacific that are currently controlled by the Japanese( Nouema, Suva, Pago Pago ) If the Japanese try to expand their holdings in the South Pacific without adequate CV cover, I expect him to extract some penalties from them.

Right now I am concerned with getting my Chinese forces in better position since a lack of or faulty communications or my own incompetence led me to believe a falsehood. And to try and get my Indian and British forces ready to repel boarders.

And BTW Nemo121, from my point of view it was a significant loss. I feel that the threat to India was much less given that the USN had 5 CVs in the Pacific that they had to account for. Now, in the long run, no a 5 to 3 exchange is not devastating at all. Just the timing is what hurts. If this was 3 - 4 months from now it would not be as bad.

[Nomad]

Nothing really new in the last turn or two. It does seem that the Japanese have pulled back some from around Christmas Island. Miller41 and I have discussed that it seems like the invasions of Australia are not being prosecuted at all. There seems to be no new advancements. I am still convinced that India is a real possibility. It is what I would be looking at doing in their position.

[traskott]

Suscribed. Nice AAR. Hury up, Allied boys !! [:)]