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October 1, 1942 – I got my "wish" and this was another extremely quiet turn. The only actions were a couple of small Allied air attacks on Japanese stragglers in the bush in Burma and China.

AuTiger is up to something in China. This turn there were over 250 fighters, over 100 bombers and something like 335 auxiliary planes in Chungking! What the Devil is he up to? I can't figure out why he is massing so much air power at Chungking. As far as I can guess, AuTiger may be doing this because:

a) He suspects that I will try some major attack again and wants to be able to crush it

b) He is reorganizing his forces again after flying units all over the map in response to my last offensive in China

c) He is planning a major offensive of his own in the region - perhaps including the use of paratroops

In any event, I moved more of my combat planes out of China and continued with the repositioning of my forces. So, for example, I've got a couple of TFs heading to Amchitka in order to remove the NLF and Base Force that have been sitting there. (There is no way that I can build that base up to a reasonable level, particularly with Winter approaching.)

I was also finally able to disband a naval dive bomber fragment that has been sitting around since I lost the CV in the South Pacific, way back when. For whatever reason that particular fragment would never disband into another grounded divebomber Chutai. But once I finally brought a full divebomber Daitai to Truk the two-plane fragment finally disbanded.

I've also decided to finally stop "pretending" with my CVEs, send them back to the Home Islands, dock them, remove their air units, and disband those air units into Daitais. The reality is that I will never have a good opportunity in the future to use those ships in an offensive role and I still need experienced pilots in order to rebuild some of my land-based air units.

October 2, 1942 – This was yet another blissfully peaceful turn, although this is obviously just the Calm Before the Storm. Nothing happened during the night phase, and the only attack during the day phase was some British 2Es trying to attack my troops in the bush in northern Burma again.

However, there were many recon flights going back and forth across the frontier in China, and more importantly, AuTiger brought some of his massive airpower from Chungking down to Changsha. So what and where does he intend to attack? Will he try to catch my air units on the ground, or will he go "Industry Hunting"?

I moved more of my remaining air units around or out of the region so that AuTiger doesn't get any "cheap points" with his overwhelming air power. I also set up an air attack of my own on the periphery, and moved a couple of my better new fighter units up closer to the Front. But more importantly, I put my fighter units in Western Japan on "alert" just in case AuTiger tries some "early" attacks on my Home Islands Industries.

The good news is that my production of resources and supplies is reasonably on track again. I lost a lot of time in the March through September time frame because I ran myself out of supplies by ever-expanding and "over-expending" my industries and forces. At least now my critical forward bases won't collapse from a lack of supplies upon the first assault that they see.

October 3, 1942 - This was a busy turn for AuTiger. First off, he sent a number of DMS ships to sweep my sub-laid mines at Dutch Harbor. But an AK that was there hit a mine anyway. Allied ships are usually able to withstand Japanese mine hits so the AK ought to be okay, unlike Japanese ships such as the DD that hit the Allied mine at Rangoon a couple of turns back, and sank in port this turn.

In the day turn AuTiger's B-17s in China hit the Resources at Nanchang. AuTiger loves to bomb my resource centers so that he can try to shut down my Industry. This hasn't affected things too badly yet, but what it does is give AuTiger's pilots lots of reasonably easy experience. However, this time, thanks to the bad weather and my AA at Nanchang a number of B-17s were damaged and a few were shot down, but not enough to discourage AuTiger from this.

My Air Ambush in Burma worked to an extent and my reasonably good Zero Daitai caught AuTiger's British 2Es unescorted. However, the Game "rewards" high experience pilots with significant advantages in air combat, even in 2E bombers, so my fighters couldn't do much damage against the obsolete British planes which have very experienced pilots from attacking my troops that have been trapped for months by the "mile-a-day" movement mechanics.

The same thing happened at Ndini where high-experience Hudsons were able to go right past my CAP to hit a transport. In reality, Hudsons were flying garbage that were never used against any real threat, but the Game allows them to become invulnerable when the pilot's experience gets high enough.

October 4, 1942 - There was some night time action from both sides this turn. AuTiger had his minesweepers out at opposite ends of the Map - Ceylon and the Aleutians. And one of my better ASW TFs caught an S-boat south of Truk and hammered it hard.

AuTiger has been busy bringing troops, supplies and what not to his eastern Aleutian bases. Things are quiet at Adak, but I expect some movement sooner rather than later. In the meanwhile I am setting in place one last "retrieval" operation to pull out the remaining naval base force at the island due west of Adak. I wonder if AuTiger will contest this again with his PTs or not?

In the meanwhile, my first pull-back operation in the far South Pacific is getting close to starting. I have half of the KB on the way down in order to provide cover for my transport TFs. AuTiger currently has little in the way of air power in the region and doesn't appear to have any naval forces there either, but it won't take him long to bring in some once he sees what I am doing.

In the air war AuTiger pulled his bombers out of Changsha and just left a mass of fighters in their place. He also put LR CAP out in case I tried to attack any neighboring bases, but my forces were quiet.

In Burma AuTiger again sent out his Brit 2Es against my troops in the jungle, despite the ambush last turn. My Zeros did so little damage that he can afford to ignore them. Also, he probably guessed that I wouldn't leave my planes in place and take a chance with them being hit on the ground, and he was right.

Speaking of hitting planes on the ground, AuTiger sent 139 Forts against the airfields at Kendari again and closed the place down. Despite the fact that I had a reasonably good Oscar Daitai on 90% CAP, half of the fighters were destroyed on the ground (along with their pilots) as were the remaining Nells that were being repaired. This is the first time that I've actually seen an air unit fragment that was totally wiped out on the ground during an air attack. In the past I've always seen some damaged planes left behind.

October 5, 1942 - This was another quiet turn, at least from the Japanese point of view. There was a little bit of Sub cat-and-mouse in the Dutch East Indies, and a couple of Allied 2E bomber attacks, but otherwise not much happened.

My recovery TF got off nicely from Kiska and ought to reach its objective next turn. I sent the surface combat escort TF out this turn so that it will arrive at the same time. My CV TF is acting "funny" and a number of ships went up to 100% activity upon refueling in Kiska. The TF did it last turn in Attu, so that's why I moved it to Kiska where there are more supplies and fuel. But whatever the TF (AI) wants wasn't there at Kiska either. Never-the-less I still ordered the TF to sail a couple of hexes to the east to provide distraction. Once this operation is complete I'll send the CV TF back to Paramushiro Jima for R&O.

Otherwise things are pretty calm and my various activities to move forces here-and-there are coming along nicely. Quiet is good.

October 6, 1942 - The night phase was quiet again other than a bit of sub chasing by one of my TF escorts. That was good news because it meant that my TFs at Ogliuga weren't being bothered.

So I flew out my planes from Ogliuga, however, for the first time in quite a while some of the float planes were damaged at the start of the turn, so they will have to be left behind. AuTiger's 2Es from the eastern Aleutians flew over my TFs but didn't attack, maybe because I had a lot of LR CAP in place. Since I only had 1500 capacity APs in the recovery TF the base force ought to load completely and be gone by next turn. BTW - my CV TF did move out from Kiska and into position despite the inexplicable use of loading points last turn.

In the meanwhile my recovery operation in the far South Pacific hit a bit of a speed bump when I realized that I didn't have any Zeros anywhere in the region. So I started a decent Daitai off along the long chain of flights towards the Gilberts and south. (The CV TF that I have sailing towards the Marshalls is still several days away.)

There were celebrations in Tokyo as the first two Divisions from Adak made it home and started to unload. The third Division will arrive tomorrow. I left the Brigade back at Paramushiro Jima because there was already a fragment of it there, and I want that Brigade to become the linchpin of my defense of Paramushiro Jima. Fortunately, the supply level at Tokyo is back up where it should be and so my nearly-lost divisions ought to rebuild reasonably quickly.

BTW - Once I got that Brigade back to Paramushiro Jima I pulled out the 2nd Division (which was all rested and built-up to the max) and sent it down to Tinian. I already have a full, experienced Division at Saipan and once those divisions that have just arrived at Tokyo are through R&R I'll send one down to Guam too. Having full Divisions in place make the job of building up fortifications much easier and quicker.

October 7, 1942 - There was some action this night turn as a Dutch sub put a torpedo into an empty AK to the southeast of Singapore. The AK's Escort then got a hit in on the sub. But that won't likely have much of an effect and so I've sent a decent ASW TF out of Singapore to try to catch the sub and do some real damage.

A surprisingly small number of Forts (around 40) hit the airfields at Kendari again this turn and wiped out more of the damaged Oscars on the ground while keeping the airfield closed. I'm sending a base force back to Macassar so that I can put some LR CAP over Kendari and the rest of the region.

In China some of AuTiger's IL 4c bombers went after the hapless 34th Division again but this time I had a Zero Daitai on LR CAP over the location and four of the Chinese bombers were shot down while several more were damaged. It was good practice for a fighter Daitai that needs lots of practice before it is "ready for Prime Time" again.

AuTiger is moving his air units around in the Far East again. He still has fighters at Changsha and Yenen, and a fair mix of planes at Chungking, but the numbers of Allied planes in the Bay of Bengal has increased substantially, particularly at Dacca. In light of this I decided not to drop in any fighters for LR CAP duty over my retiring units in the northern Burmese jungle. The whole thing smells too much of a trap or an airfield-closing campaign.

My pull-out from Ogliuga went without opposition. As I expected there are three damaged Jakes left at Ogliuga, so since I have a spare AK around I am going to send it over to see if I can retrieve those planes. At the same time I'll hit Adak again just to keep AuTiger honest.

The three battered but not broken Infantry Divisions from the Adak Mess all unloaded at Tokyo and are now settling-in to the long road back to full capability. I'm just happy that I wasn't forced to start over from "scratch" with fragments.

I moved the globe-trotting Zero Daitai a long step closer to providing support of the South Pacific withdrawal as it reached Kwajalein. And my CV TF is also just about at Kwajalein, so soon I'll be prepared to react if AuTiger attempts to interfere with my plans. My idea for the South Pacific would have been a good one if I hadn't squandered so many months with the "Aleutian Affair", but there is no point now trying to hold those lonesome bases any longer.

In other news, the 116th/A reached 59 elapsed miles and so is on the brink of moving a hex closer to Lashio. I would love to believe that this unit will finally move, but I don't have high hopes. There is no good reason in the World that the unit shouldn't move, but then, when did "good reasons" have anything to do with a lot of the programming logic in this Game?

October 8, 1942 - This was another nice peaceful night, other than some minesweeping at Rangoon. I love all of this quiet - it makes it much easier for me to rebuild my stocks of supplies, fuel and forces.

There was only one air attack as around 90 Mitchells and 50 Tomahawks hit the air fields at Lautem. AuTiger certainly wants to keep my air fields in that region closed. Otherwise there were just a lot of recon flights by both sides.

BTW - my Transport TF made it to Wallis Island and was spotted this turn. But AuTiger must have had some warning last turn because the Air Balance at the nearby Allied-controlled islands was up a bit this turn. Fortunately, I had all 1500 capacity APs in the TF and my Globe-Trotting Zeros made it to a nearby friendly base from where they will provide LR CAP next turn.

The REALLY BIG NEWS this turn was that the 116th/A moved off of its mountain peak and is now one hex closer to Lashio. That means that in the absence of some active interference by Allied troops this divided unit may actually reach a road in about two more months' time. Considering that I've been trying to move this unit for six months of Game Time, one has to believe that my troops really, REALLY liked being on that mountain next to Yunan.

The REALLY SCREWY NEWS this turn was that I accidentally found out that a Construction Engineering unit that I've had sitting at Tori Shima for quite some time was quietly trying to march back to Osaka on its own. Yes, that is "march", as in "march under water", or maybe "march on the water". The unit had 37 elapsed miles on its journey. That unit wanted to go home really, REALLY badly! [X(]

October 9, 1942 - Once again the only night time action was more minesweeping at Rangoon. And the day phase was something of a duplicate of the previous day as the only action was another B-25/P-40E attack on the air fields at Lautem.

One thing that changed was that a number of Allied subs showed up in the DEI and the Solomons for the first time in quite a while. My planes are chasing them and I'm sending out some more ASW TFs, so maybe a few of them will be driven home.

Surprisingly, AuTiger pulled his air units out of Pago-Pago and surrounding Allied bases and allowed my recovery TF to leave Wallis without bother. I've still got the LR CAP on the TF and will until they are safely behind the Frontier. My CV TF also reached Kwajalein this turn, so I replenished it and ordered it to head down to Tarawa. It might turn out useful to have the ability to surprise AuTiger in that region. In any event, I intend to pull my troops back from the other far South Pacific bases and having CVs around just adds a margin of safety.

In Burma the 4th Mixed Regiment finally got out of the northern Burmese jungle and back on the rail line. So it ought to be back in Rangoon licking its wounds soon enough.

And there was more encouraging news concerning the 116th/A - it did 2 miles since the last turn! I wonder if it will keep up that "blistering" pace?

October 10, 1942 – My naval bombardment of Adak went off with no hitches, but it also didn't do a lot of damage. Never-the-less, it does send a message to AuTiger that I can still do that.

On the other hand, I wasted the general effort because my transport TF didn't stick around at Ogliuga to let me retrieve those damaged Jakes. I was certain that I set the TF to "remain on station", but gawd knows. In any event, I am sending it back for another try. However, I may not be so lucky this time because the weather is clearing up in the region for the first time in a gawdawful amount of time.

There was only one Allied bombing attack this turn; 27 Forts tried to bomb Taung Gyi but didn't hit anything. I suspect that AuTiger was trying to guess where I might put in an "ambush squadron", but I actually didn't send anyone forward this turn. Never-the-less, it made me realize that I didn't have enough Air Recon units forward to keep AuTiger guessing, so I moved some forward again.

The 116th/A moved to a grand total of 4 miles this turn. Does this mean that it will only take one month to move to the next hex?

My recovery TF with the SNLF that was at Wallis Island continued to steam towards Truk unmolested, so I stood-down the Zeros that had been on LR CAP. I'm going to keep them in the region because I intend to pull more units out of the far South Pacific.

Otherwise I am continuing to move forces around. I am now in the comfortable position of being able to pull back from the front in China the various smaller regiments and miscellaneous combat units that I had there and replace them with rebuilt Divisions and Brigades that have been doing garrison duty at the various Chinese port cities. It's only too bad that I learned much too late in this particular pbem the critical importance of keeping my better forces together from the start.

I am also swapping out and rebuilding my good Zero Daitais that are still on Duty in the Western Aleutians. Once I have my lines in the region stabilized I will reduce my front-line air power and move those good units to other uses elsewhere.

October 11, 1942 – The night phase was quiet as usual, with only my lone MSW sweeping mines out of the harbour at Rangoon. The day phase brought action however, as AuTiger's air units took off in great numbers from many locations.

First off 144 B-17s hit the airfields at Kendari again, keeping the place totally closed and getting rid of the remaining damaged Oscars on the ground. Then 143 Mitchells, escorted by 52 P-40Bs, hit the airfields at Lautem again. It certainly looks like AuTiger is thinking hard about trying an invasion of Timor or somewhere else in the region.

In the CBI AuTiger's British 2Es hit the SNLF stragglers that are still in the jungle to the north of the railroad in Burma. The 4th Mixed Regiment made it to Rangoon so AuTiger didn't bother going after them again. And for the first time in ages some Chinese 2Es hit the pitiful 114th/A in the jungle to the southeast of Lashio. Never-the-less, the 114th/A continued it's "blistering" pace and gained another two miles for a grand total of six. AuTiger is also planning more air attacks in China proper because bombers returned to Changsha this turn, along with auxiliary planes and the ever-present P-40s.

However, I've decided it is time to try a few ambushes just in case AuTiger is getting a bit too cocky. Therefore, I brought fighters in to fly LR CAP over the retiring SNLF and the 114th/A, and also a couple of bomber groups to try to catch some of those Chinese 2Es on the ground in Yunan. At the same time I brought a number of my better "modern" fighter Daitais back into China into the bases surrounding Shanghai. I set those fighters to 90% CAP at high altitude, and also put other fighters nearby to LR CAP over Shanghai. In addition, I took my other fighters in the region off of "Training" and set them to 90% CAP over my important bases in the Western Home Islands and other bases within B-17 reach of Changsha.

Sure, there's a low probability that I will actually catch any of AuTiger's bombers since he has so many targets to choose from, and the high experience levels of his pilots mean that his bombers will most likely out-fight my fighters anyway, but I feel that I ought to try something.

Elsewhere, AuTiger continues to be fairly quiet. Although plenty of Catalinas patrolled over my transport TF at Ogliuga and my other bases in the region, no Allied planes attacked, nor did any Allied ships show up. So I was able to load the damaged Jakes onto the AK and set them to join their compatriots back at Attu. My plans are coming along nicely in the region and I ought to have things where I want them within a couple more game-weeks.

The far South Pacific was equally quiet although the Air Balance over AuTiger's bases in the region went up again. However, this may only be due to bombers in transit. Obviously, AuTiger must be flying a huge number of bomber units to Australia in order to mount an attack by 143 Mitchells.

October 12, 1942 – Once again the only action during the evening phase was my lone minesweeper sweeping a mine out of Rangoon Harbor. I'm not sure why the MSW can't sweep more than one mine at a time, but at least it is getting lots of practice this way.

The day phase was almost equally quiet as generally bad weather returned most everywhere. Therefore, not only AuTiger's regular bombing attacks didn't fly, but my planned ambushes didn't fly either. However, my small air-to-ground nuisance attacks in far Southeast China did fly so that was a nice change of pace.

I immediately pulled my attackers back and re-shuffled my air units in China since AuTiger still has his good fighters, bombers and auxiliary planes in Changsha, along with his backups in Chungking. I continue to expect a 4E attack to hit somewhere in China, but I'm not sure of when or where. In parallel I increased my ambush and attack air units in the SEA. Hopefully, some of them will take off and catch some Allied planes in the air or on the ground next turn.

In the absence of any air interference the 116th/A moved up to 10 elapsed miles this turn. AuTiger moved one of his LCUs along the road from Yunan just opposite across the river from my unit. AuTiger must be thinking that I am trying to cut the road, instead of my actual plan, which is to finally get out of that Movement Trap.

Things were also quiet in the Aleutians. My Jake-recovery TF is almost back to Attu. Only Catalinas flew from the Allied side. It appears that AuTiger is even reducing his air cover in the region a bit. But I'm not through being a pest in the region yet, so I ordered my Bettys at Kiska to fly an airfield attack on Adak next turn and I am also sending out the BB TF to bombard Adak again. In addition, I am sending a replacement Surface Combat TF back to Kiska from Paramushiro Jima. However, I have given orders to my CV TF to return to Paramushiro Jima at Mission speed.

So, for the most part it was yet another day of moving forces around. I am slowly getting all of my Pacific bases equipped with Naval Base Forces instead of Army or Air Force base forces. This way any incoming Allied TFs have to deal with at least a few coastal guns. I am also moving Army and Air Force Base Forces back to Manchuria. I stripped them out at the beginning of this game and in retrospect I probably shouldn't have done that. I lost a lot of flexibility in the positioning of my air units in China thanks to that early decision and I won't do it again in future pbems.

I am also making certain that I have a "stock" of Army and Air Force Base Forces in my non-malarial main bases so that I can quickly move them back into strategic malarial bases when I need them. Whenever AuTiger finally strikes I expect him to hit very hard and I want to be able to respond locally to any breakthrough instead of having to move units over long distances.

October 13, 1942 – This was one of those turns where not much went well, but not much went really badly either. The night phase started out with my third or fourth unsuccessful attempt to recover some planes out of Ndini as the AV that was sailing in this time hit an Allied sub-laid mine. Between Allied bombers and Allied mines Ndini has turned into an unjustifiably costly sink-hole for me instead of the "stepping stone" that I expected it to be so long ago.

Bad weather across the northern third of the map made a mess of the air plans of both sides again. Some of my bombers flew to attack the air fields at Yunan, but they did little damage and caught no planes on the ground. And there were no Allied bombers attacking my troops in the field in Burma, so my LR CAP was for nought.

In a very strange move, a number of P-40s flew over Nanchang. I didn't have any CAP over the base, and no enemy bombers showed up, so I have no idea why those planes were there nor what their mission was supposed to be. Maybe they were escorts that didn't have any bombers to escort, maybe they were on LR CAP for some reason, or maybe AuTiger guessed wrongly that I would have CAP in place and sent them in on a sweep.

In any event, I pulled back my 2E bombers and ordered some divebombers to attack some Chinese troops in the field next turn. I also pulled back my weaker fighter units. I am actually hoping that AuTiger sends out his P-40s at extreme range against one of my Tony or Tojo Daitais that is sitting at 90% CAP and 30K feet.

In other news, the unmolested 116th/A reached 12 miles this turn, so the 2 mile-per-day movement rate seems to be sustainable. The SNLF fragment in northern Burma was also unmolested but is only moving at one mile-per-day and appears to be losing troops faster than it can get out of the jungle, so I may lose that fragment. Oh well, that will allow the "parent" unit to rebuild, so that's not all bad.

In naval news, another of my battleships received its October 1942 upgrade. That leaves only two BBs to go and both have Systems Damage that is less than 10. Since they are both in large ports that contain Repair Shipyards they ought to upgrade within the next couple of weeks. In the meanwhile the Akagi still sits at System Damage 12, where it has been for a week or so. The Akagi was supposed to upgrade in August, but despite sitting by itself in various big ports containing Repair Shipyards, ARs and even Naval HQs, the System Damage for Akagi has only gone down by 8 points in the past several months. This may be a case of the Game "working as designed", but it seems to be a poor "design" to me. BTW – the system damage of the Akagi only started to go down once I started to dock my BBs in port for repairs and upgrades. Go figure.

October 14, 1942 – This was a very quiet turn, even by the standards of this pbem of late. The only thing that happened during the night phase was that Ogliuga Island reverted back to Allied control "automatically". AuTiger is getting a bit ambitious in the region and the Air Balance at Atka has gone up. But my latest bombardment TF will hit next turn so maybe this will be an opportunity for my forces to catch some Allied planes on the ground.

Otherwise, the only action came from a couple of tit-for-tat light bomber attacks on each other's troops in the field in the Burmese/Chinese border area. Once again AuTiger lucked out and my LR CAP ambush was waiting over the wrong target.

The 116th/A is alone once more as the Allied unit across the river disappeared. I presume that AuTiger sent it back to base. Unmolested, my troops gained another 2 miles on their journey to Lashio and now sit at 14 elapsed miles.

October 15, 1942 - My naval bombardment hit Adak Island without a hitch this turn, but it sure didn't have much of an effect. All that was accomplished was to cause a dozen or so casualties. Oh well, the Yamato is back so maybe a larger bombardment TF will do more.

There was the usual bad weather over most of the map again. I don't remember seeing a "Clear" day over Tokyo since the start of this pbem. However, AuTiger has gotten lucky with his weather over northern Australia where his bases have remained reasonably clear for quite some time while my bases in the DEI remain under rain. This means that AuTiger's bombers can usually take off, although there is no guarantee that they will find their targets. This also means that I can't sneak a bombardment TF in to keep AuTiger "honest".

So after an initial false start in which a few B-17s couldn't find Kendari, 137 B-17s flew and hammered the airfields there again in the afternoon. I finally got a base force into Morotai and flew in some Tojos and decent Zeros, so maybe the next time AuTiger sends the B-17s I'll have a chance to put a little opposition in his path.

In China the weather continued to be bad but AuTiger's bombers finally flew out of Changsha along with their P-40 escorts. The Liberators hit the resources at Nanking, but were hit back by a lot of flak so AuTiger took a couple of losses and a number of damaged planes.

The Chinese light bombers flew against the 34th Division again so I decided that it was time to bring up more planes and try for a few ambushes again. I have a number of reasonably good fighter units now set on LR CAP over my troops in the open in China and Burma and as well have bombers and escorts set to try to bomb the secondary airfields where AuTiger's Chinese 2Es are bases. I am trying out Tojos and Tonys as escorts for my bombers, so it will be interesting to see how well they do if they run into any P-40s on LR CAP.

In land news, the 116th/A is now at 16 elapsed miles, so it looks like it will reach Lashio before Christmas. The 4th Mixed Regiment is now only two hexes from Rangoon on the Burmese railway, so it will be in for full R&R soon. Only the fragment of the 2nd SNLF which is still in the jungle to the north of the Burmese railroad is doing poorly as it is now down to 11 disabled squads with 18 more miles to go before it gets out of the bush. I'm pretty sure that it won't make it.

October 16, 1942 - This was yet another quiet evening, with only some Allied MSWs minesweeping way off in the far reaches of the Bay of Bengal. I've actually cut back on my routing mining of the Bay of Bengal ports and am focusing now on the Northern Australian coast and the DEI bases near there.

I keep on thinking that AuTiger is planning a major strike into that region in order to cut me off from my main resource and oil supplies. I have a fair number of forces in the region, but they aren't really the "right" forces for defense-in-depth. Instead what I have there are the units which I expected to back up any offensives in the region. So I am once again reconsidering my immediate distribution of forces and starting to move more forces into the region. Hopefully, AuTiger will continue to give me the time to bring more of the "right type" of forces to the region.

AuTiger was generally quiet this turn, and in contrast a couple of my plans actually worked for a change. An air attack flew against bombers at Hengchow and actually caused some reasonable damage to the air fields, but no bombers were caught on the ground. Then one of my Ambush Flights actually caught some Chinese 2Es over the 34th Division and shot a few down. It wasn't at all like the sorts of results AuTiger gets with his highly experienced pilots, but it was still a lot better than I've seen in quite some time.

On the other hand, the other key airfield attack didn't fly, and my other Ambush Flights didn't have anything to ambush, but they did suffer unpleasant numbers of Operational Losses in the lousy weather. That exemplifies what I dislike about the "Advanced Weather" - my less experienced pilots are continuously lost to bad weather before they can gain enough experience to gain any experience.

What I have been doing is setting my less-experienced air units to Training at an altitude or 5000 feet and a maximum distance of "1". I also have them in my larger air bases in the Home Islands. But because EVERY BASE in the Home Islands suffers from Thunderstorms almost EVERY TURN my planes either don't fly or I lose a handful of rookies each turn. I'm sorry, but that is B.S.

In other news, the 116th/A is up to 18 elapsed miles, and the Kure 2nd SNLF fragment is up to 44 miles, without losing more squads.

October 17, 1942 – The night phase was another case of Peace and Quiet, but the day phase brought a fair amount of action and a few new things.

First off, AuTiger sent his Indian Forts off on a "hunting expedition" for my fighters in Burma. The Forts had difficulties finding Taung Gyi during the morning phase, but when they arrived in the afternoon they ran into a Daitai of Tonys for the first time. The Tonys acquitted themselves quite well, shooting down 4 out of the 12 Forts and damaging most of the others, with no Tonys lost.

The next nice effort came at Canton where AuTiger sent a unit of P-38s out on a sweep for the first time. 24 P-38s ran into 16 A6M2s and 22 Tonys. The Tonys did well and shot down 4 of the P-38s without a loss to themselves. And even the A6M2s only lost one plane.

In the meanwhile one of my washed-out bombing attacks from the previous day finally flew as Helens and a weak Zero Daitai bombed Yunan again. AuTiger had already pulled out his Chinese bombers so there weren't any to catch on the ground, but at least my pilots received some useful experience.

A less pleasant result came from the first air raid on Lunga by 4Es from Luganville. 100 B-17s and B-24s hit the air fields and port at Lunga. I had a reasonably good Zero Daitai on CAP, but despite taking some damage the bombers went through with their mission readily and hit their targets quite hard. I lost 9 A6M2s on the ground, and the already damaged AV that just got to port was damaged some more.

There isn't much that I can do about the situation in the South Pacific at this time other than to re-distribute my planes so that I minimize losses to 4E bombing raids. This certainly makes me happy again that I went to the trouble to grab Port Moresby way-back-when. Otherwise AuTiger would be regularly making the South Pacific untenable for me.

The situation in Asia is a different story. I've got to think that AuTiger will be unhappy with the results from his raids against my Tonys. I moved more Tonys into Canton and moved the Zeros out to Hong Kong, where I also moved in more Zeros with more experienced pilots. It will be interesting to see if he tries again with more fighters or with his fighters moved to closer air bases. Also, will he try to use some bombers against my base in conjunction with fighters?

In Burma I pulled back all of my fighter units in order to let the successful Tony defenders recover and also to give more training to my Zero Daitais. AuTiger has too many planes in that region to take any unnecessary chances.

In ground news the 4th Mixed Regiment finally made it back to Rangoon for full R&R. The 116th/A also reached 20 elapsed miles. And the Kure SNLF reached 46 elapsed miles, but at the same time went down to 10 damaged squads thanks to a strong British air raid. In China AuTiger brought a third LCU up against the trapped 34th Division, but their additional strength didn't change the situation much. The AI didn't help me way-back-when when it stupidly moved the 34th into a trap, but it now isn't helping AuTiger any as it makes him attack the 34th over and over again.

In Naval news, another of my BBs received its October 1942 upgrades, leaving only one BB to go. And the Akagi has quietly edged down to an Operational Damage level of 7, so who knows, maybe even the Akagi will be upgraded before Christmas.

My Christmas 1942 "wish" is that production date for the Oscar II will move ahead a month from its current January 1943 date, since I have over 220 planes-worth of R&D for this model. Sure, the Oscar II isn't anything great, but I would take paper kites in trade for my Nates at this point.

October 18, 1942 – The night phase was Peace and Quiet again other than a lone MSW sweeping a mine out of Ndini harbour. But the day period brought some ominous portents of things that may come.

The biggest change was that 154 B-17s hit the Port at Maumere. I've had a Base Force there for some time so that I could build up a back-up to my bases at Timor. As usual with Japanese engineering, it has been taking "forever" to try to build up the air fields to level 2 (and they still aren't there) so that I could use Maumere for some bomber support against naval attacks on Timor.

But why make a Port attack? I realized afterwards that what AuTiger is likely trying to do is to prepare for an invasion – Port attacks are the best means to get rid of any CD guns that may be present. This attack was followed up by another big attack on the airfields at Lautem by 157 Mitchells accompanied by 52 P-40Bs.

So AuTiger must be planning a mass invasion of multiple targets in the region and he wants to be certain that my forces will be out of supply, disrupted and that I won't be able to bring in air support from my backup bases. This fits in with the "vacuum" that I am seeing in the South-central and Eastern Pacific. There is no Allied Air Presence to speak of anywhere along the usual island bases. And AuTiger has totally ignored my activities in the South-central Pacific. (AuTiger likely assumes that the forces that are present on the Allied Atolls can withstand any Japanese raids long enough for back-up forces to arrive.)

What is particularly discouraging is that because of high pilot experience levels AuTiger is losing almost no planes to Operational Losses despite flying long distances with huge numbers of planes. I lose three times more planes and pilots on Range 1 Training flights each turn than AuTiger loses with three times the number of Air Operations each turn. Oh well, all I can do is to continue to reposition my forces and hope that AuTiger gives me the time that I need, and that he eventually makes a mistake of some sort.

Things were quiet in China as AuTiger re-thought his situation there in light of the failure of his P-38s to "wipe the sky" of my fighters. The weather was also lousy as usual, so I have no doubt that AuTiger will be back to try something else new soon enough.

In Burma the British 2Es attacked the Kure 2nd SNLF again but didn't hit any of the remaining troops, so the unit increased its movement to 48 elapsed miles without losing any more squads. The 116th/A also continued on its trek to Lashio and reached 24 elapsed miles.

AuTiger is getting impatient with the trapped 34th Division and added a fourth Chinese unit to the attack, but was rewarded with the same mediocre results. Land combat, like Land movement, tends to be a joke in this game, only this time I get to "laugh" at the results. But I still think that it is a sad excuse for a proper war game land combat system.

October 19, 1942 – It was Peace and Quiet again during the night phase until my naval bombardment TF went in and hit Adak. Things didn't start out well as one of the escorting DDs hit a mine, but the rest of the force went ahead and did a fair job on the base. A Dauntless and a couple of Catalinas were destroyed on the ground, the various facilities were hit reasonably well, and there were over a hundred casualties amongst the defending troops. It wasn't a "nuclear" attack by any means but it still sent a good message to AuTiger not to take things for granted in the Aleutians. BTW – Atka reverted automatically to the Allied side, which is fine because that is one less empty base for AuTiger to use as a training target.

But the Aleutians aren't AuTiger's primary area of interest, as the day's main air battle showed. AuTiger, likely feeling a bit frustrated by the results of his first P-38 raid against Canton, sent more P-38s this turn, along with B-24s. 20 P-38s and 35 B-24s flew from Changsha to Canton and ran into 60 Tonys on high altitude CAP. Once again the Tonys performed well; 14 P-38s were shot down versus 7 Tonys, and the Liberators shot down more of the Tonys than did the P-38s. The Tonys also shot down 4 Liberators and damaged a lot more. The big bombers eventually did get through, but they didn't cause much damage and only a couple of recon planes were destroyed on the ground. And since I once again have all of my Southern Field Army back in Canton all of the damage was repaired by daylight.

So, will AuTiger try it again? My Tonys came through the battle in good shape with only a few planes under repair. Never-the-less, I've started to move up my next half-way decent Tony Daitai towards Canton, and if AuTiger gives me a day's respite there will be even more Tonys to greet him the next time that he "comes a calling".

The only other air action was an attack by Chinese 2Es on the trapped 34th Division. The subsequent land assault achieved much better odds against the 34th this time, but the overall results were still pretty much the same as usual. Never-the-less, I'm betting that AuTiger will send out his 2Es again next turn so I've moved a number of half-way decent Zero Daitais into position at different bases and set them to fly LR CAP missions over the 34th next turn. With any luck the Chinese bombers will have a rough trip.

In other land news, the Kure 2nd SNLF fragment received a break from the regular British air attacks this turn, so it advanced to 50 elapsed miles without losing any squads. And better yet, it actually received some supplies for the first time in a long, long time. The 116th/A didn't receive any supplies but it still moved up to 28 elapsed miles.

Otherwise, I just continued to re-distribute my forces. A Naval Base force arrived at Soerabaja this turn to back up the Special Base Force that is already there, and I redirected another Naval Base Force towards Kendari, instead of having it land in the Philippines. I also sent a fully-repaired and upgraded cruiser/destroyer TF out of Tokyo and down towards Saipan.

And in surprising news, the System Damage on the Akagi dropped to 5 today! That is with the damage on the Hyuga dropping to 6 at the same time. (They aren't in the same ports.) They were both at Sys Dam 7 yesterday, so this is quite a pleasant turn of events. Now watch, the Akagi will probably revert to taking weeks to get down to Sys Dam 3 before it can finally upgrade.

Hi Dive.  I just wanted to let you know I'm still reading and enjoying your war and AAR.  [8D]