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Midway and subs around it as well as constant reconnaissance. Not very subtle again. You can also see my naval forces at Pearl. I am sending an additional 50AV by APD to reinforce the 120AV already at Midway with its 4 forts. Unfortunately, one CV is in repair for 50 days from taking a torpedo and 2 Cleveland-class CLs went into refit for 16 more days. Nonetheless, I like my chances. Also notice, Midway is well-supplied.

April 6th, 1944

Something might or might not be approaching Midway we'll see. As stated before, it has 4 forts, a CD unit, and an army regiment. It will be joined by the 1 Spec SVC Unit (US Rangers) by APD in 2 turns. This will raise the AV to ~160 with 4 forts. So far all I've seen that might be trying for it is a Brigade unit of some sort. My CVEs, CV/CVL, and various surface units set sail from Pearl today just in case. Subs are being posted at Midway as well. My surface units will be 1 fast BB SCTF, 2 slow BB SCTFs, a CA/DD SCTF, and 5-6 DD SCTFs. My CVEs and CV/CVL combine for ~750 A/C.

April 7th, 1944

Interesting turn more for the tea leaves than the action. First, in we decide to send in one of our carrier units to hit John's transports near Port Blair (he seemed to be thinking we were heading back to port so I flanked one back just in case).



More interestingly, John has setup his subs in some sort of cordon south of Midway, he moved them slightly down and setup a straight line. Furthermore, sub Burrfish gets 10/10 DL by "Japanese dive bomber" type aircraft near Wake. Could be Wake's ASW patrols, but I think it might be carriers, especially given the "heavy radio activity" from the previous turn. The question is do I try to land my 50 AV with the APDs this turn and risk John sending his carriers forward or do I hang back and land them after the Japanese landings, figuring John won't be able to immediately take a 4-fort island with 112 AV. And the real interesting thing is John seems to have a division planning for one of the Hawaiian bases...interesting. Don't know if that's just misdirection on John's part, cause he strikes me as the guy crazy enough to do it. I should note I have significant AV on each of the island and will bring up some new divisions from San Francisco to Pearl shortly. As guessed, John also seems to have designs on the SoPac; I have reinforced Manus but I'll bring stuff up from Australia to Lae, etc. too.

I should note I plan to bring some carriers back from India soon because I can have good local supremacy even with divided carriers.

Maybe he wants some good coffee from Hawaii?

I hope he does. I have lots lots lots of fighters and bombers at Pearl, and lots of AV on each of the islands, since I use them as staging grounds. So, I seriously doubt its happening. If it does, he'll suffer.

April 8th, 1944

The beast appears. It seems a Midway operation was on the table; I wonder if John thinks this will be as easy as Wake. It shouldn't be...and if a brigade is all he is bringing, it shouldn't be enough. My APDs should be able to offload the 1st Spec Svc Unit and its 50AV before leaving. More importantly, the APDs are not detected so he shouldn't know they are there. John might try rushing his carriers forward anyways now that his TFs have been discovered.

I'm thinking that Kona planning has to be a head fake. Even the Midway run seems fishy, as one brigade is certainly not going to cut it. Is anything happening elsewhere?

Interesting times.

Cheers,
CB

I'm inclined to believe the Midway op is real; this is like the 5th day in a row we've gotten sigint of a 3/4th Brigade or a 2/4th Brigade (i.e. loaded on transports based on the name) is planning an attack on Midway. Moreover, based on the heavy radio activity, the enemy TFs west of Midway have been moving to slow to just be carriers/SCTFs, most likely including slower ships such as transports. I think John might try, reasons being he already showed his earnestness through invading Wake and he might think my defenses are equally lax at Midway, or at least not too robust. But yes, this can certainly be a massive diversion. He could also be luring my naval forces into a trap, but its hard to see me being more than evenly matched, unless I seriously miscounted his carriers.

Other than that, numerous sigint points to John planning to take back bases around Guinea, such as Lae and Manus. This also could just be an attempt to get me to move my forces out of India, where he is in trouble.

I believe your analysis is correct based on what you have in SIGINT and what you are seeing on the map. I find it hard to believe though that he is only bringing a Bde, which would only defeat a Defense BN and maybe some engineers and base force units. So either he grossly under estimated the garrison there or he has more than what you are seeing in SIGINT. The rule of thumb for an Atoll, my rule that is, you must have a 3-1 advantage when assaulting. Also you must land in the early phase so as to have two phases to offload and bombard. Good luck and good hunting.

April 9th, 1944

The plan revealed. John will most likely attempt landings and his force is covered by one carrier force; furthermore he has another KB force that was hiding in the north, perhaps planning to try to come down on any Allied force sallying from Hawaii, very reminiscent of the actual Japanese Midway plan in a way. The real question is this: I now have 160 AV at Midway with level 4 forts. I can move back and simply let him try first before moving in. On the other hand, I am in prime position to potentially meet John's carriers in a turn with my fighters. While his carrier force is quite sizable, I do have a large advantage in fighters, at least based on the current numbers I'm seeing. I could move forward with CAP set to the full 100% for all 600 fighters to try and decimate his carriers bombers and make this a pure SCTF fight. I have lots of combat ships.

What would you do?

ORIGINAL: Anachro

April 9th, 1944

The plan revealed. John will most likely attempt landings and his force is covered by one carrier force; furthermore he has another KB force that was hiding in the north, perhaps planning to try to come down on any Allied force sallying from Hawaii, very reminiscent of the actual Japanese Midway plan in a way. The real question is this: I now have 160 AV at Midway with level 4 forts. I can move back and simply let him try first before moving in. On the other hand, I am in prime position to potentially meet John's carriers in a turn with my fighters. While his carrier force is quite sizable, I do have a large advantage in fighters, at least based on the current numbers I'm seeing. I could move forward with CAP set to the full 100% for all 600 fighters to try and decimate his carriers bombers and make this a pure SCTF fight. I have lots of combat ships.

What would you do?

Does he genuinely believe Midway will be a sustained base from him, or is he trying to break up your plans? I suspect it's the latter. I find it hard to believe he thinks he can support Midway, so you'd potentially see him evac after the first failed shock. It may not be worth a can of Spam, but i'd say go for his planes and ships.

ORIGINAL: Anachro

April 9th, 1944

The plan revealed. John will most likely attempt landings and his force is covered by one carrier force; furthermore he has another KB force that was hiding in the north, perhaps planning to try to come down on any Allied force sallying from Hawaii, very reminiscent of the actual Japanese Midway plan in a way. The real question is this: I now have 160 AV at Midway with level 4 forts. I can move back and simply let him try first before moving in. On the other hand, I am in prime position to potentially meet John's carriers in a turn with my fighters. While his carrier force is quite sizable, I do have a large advantage in fighters, at least based on the current numbers I'm seeing. I could move forward with CAP set to the full 100% for all 600 fighters to try and decimate his carriers bombers and make this a pure SCTF fight. I have lots of combat ships.

What would you do?

The more I think about it, the more I think you want a fight. It's 1944. It's your turf. You have a nearby base, he doesn't. There are risks, but definitely reward here for your as well.

On your surface TFs, remember that LOWER numbered TFs usually engage first. If you can, re-arrange them so the DD TFs take lower TF numbers and engage first. That way his TFs will hopefully exhaust their ammo before they engage with your larger ships.

It will suck for the DD TFs, but that's life as a tin-can sailor!

John is soo predictable. [;)]

You should crush him, take his women and listen to their laments! Break him.

But be careful with your tactics....

Keep in mind my force is mostly slow CVEs with one CV/CVL. This can change the outlook. Tactics, as Lowpe says, have to be very careful. I'm not sure if John has his settings for air strike or if he is purely on defensive CAP at the moment. If he was set to strike settings, I'd definitely send my force due east towards him to trigger a crippling Mariana's esque attack by him bombers. If that doesn't happen, I reveal my position for little gain. The other option is to move towards Midway to prepare to hit his weaker force, transports, and SCTFs there. The 3rd option of course is set back and wait for him to move closer before moving in, maybe after he expends his SCTF ammo on bombardments?

I should note than a number of subs you don't see appeared on the map and are hidden behind the black box showing Midway's garrison. The subs are moving in the direction of Pearl and this implied that his plans were that I wouldn't move out from Pearl until after his forces were spotted. No doubt the subs are meant to detect anything coming. He has no idea that my forces, like at the historical Midway, have moved north to be east of Midway, nor have any patrols spotted my ships.

If you can generate PT boats at Midway, send waves of them in first then your small DD forces.

The turn is away. I opted to simply move my TFs together slightly southwest towards Midway to maintain air protection for one more day on the TFs; it has a good chance of being in range of enemy CV strikes and hopefully absorbing and wrecking John's strike ability. Then the SCTFs will go hunting the next day. In addition, multiple PT squads are heading directly west towards John's invasion TFs, hopefully they sink something, more importantly I hope they deplete enemy ammo.

We will see if John gets busy all of a sudden.[:)] Good plan.

I probably would have been even more aggressive, depending what is at Midway. An AD, along with say 100 fighters, I would have sent scads of multiple destroyers to the invasion staging area west of Midway with a home port of Midway.

Bear in mind, I have no experience using multiple small task forces as Allies, but I think they would work pretty well, plus they would draw only small air strikes from his carriers that the CAP could tear into.

So, a raid and a Cap Trap all in one. Might have backed the CVE force off to the north and looked for an engagement on the following day...definitely set it 100% defensive.

Don't use your slow battleships. Not worth it, I think. They are so tricky to use in combat. Save them to counter bombard if the IJ actually invades.

He has to expect scads of PT boats though...doesn't he?

Try to get some subs behind him.

Your APD TF spotted previously will actually embolden him I think.[:D]

That Dot base should fall to Japan, if they are serious. It really should have a small garrison and be flying naval search out of. Would have been fun to have a ton of disbanded PT boats hiding there, and let John alone until tomorrow...

Yes, I had considered much of what you said. The big problem for me is I'd most likely be detected the following day if I hung back while trying to straddle a range from which I could act the following day. In this mod, Japan gets some very nice longer-rang dedicated scout units on her carriers. Rather than doing this, though the reward on success might be greater, I opt for sending things in this turn to have a higher chance of getting a nice absorption of any strike sent against my 100% CAP.

The invasion TF seems to be moving 6-7 hexes a turn, so I should reach it with my PTs, doubly so if John speeds up the invasion TF on the way in to get it to the beaches sooner. Not sure if John expect PTs, because we haven't had a chance to use them too much, he has not seen them from recon on previous turns, and might think we don't have the supply to create PTs on short notice at Midway.

For reference, these are the scout planes on Japanese carriers. He might have the Myrt now, who knows, with that radius very hard to sneak up on him. He could be employing the Kate recon plane with its very viable 12-hex range. This is how he discovered me so early as I was approaching Wake.

Myrt and Judy are stock, and normally only a very few squadrons can upgrade to them. Judy though is heavily modded.

That Kate is just damn nasty. How the hell does it even have a bomb & reduced load? [:(] Judy has a bomb load too. He must never use the Myrt since he didn't give them a bomb load too. Must be nice to have MAD and Radar. Sheesh.

Do the Allies get anything similar, i.e. CV capable Recon with bomb loads?

That is one heck of an insidious advantage.

No, I do not believe so, at least I haven't seen them but I can double-check, nor do we get dedicated recon squad units. The main Japanese carriers start with a fourth air unit, a 3-plane recon unit. The starting plane for these units is the Kate above. Anyways, no email back from John yet.