Oct 20th 1943
The enemy continues to reconnoiter ruthless, regarding his troops. Another echelon was spared to have some party at Buka...
AFTER ACTION REPORT
Weather: Rain
Ground combat at Buka
Allied Shock attack
Attacking force 7 troops, 0 guns, 0 vehicles
Defending force 1771 troops, 0 guns, 0 vehicles
Allied assault odds: 0 to 1 (fort level 3)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
two Germans in the Pacific - Sc17
RE: recon continues
aerial recon is now allocated to more than a dozen of my bases (Rabaul, Hoskins, Gasmata, Madang, Saidor, Wewak, Shortlands, Vila, Munda, Russells, Rennell, Tulagi, Lunga and Irau), carried out with planes of any kind.
Still busy enemy shipping in the NW Coral Sea and around PNG, but suspicious silence in the Hebrides area... [&:]
Naval warfare is calm, aside from barge hunting and some submarines disturbing my operations.
Still busy enemy shipping in the NW Coral Sea and around PNG, but suspicious silence in the Hebrides area... [&:]
Naval warfare is calm, aside from barge hunting and some submarines disturbing my operations.
RE: recon continues
ORIGINAL: RGIJN
aerial recon is now allocated to more than a dozen of my bases (Rabaul, Hoskins, Gasmata, Madang, Saidor, Wewak, Shortlands, Vila, Munda, Russells, Rennell, Tulagi, Lunga and Irau), carried out with planes of any kind.
So many targets but only few time left....[:(]
RE: recon continues
ORIGINAL: fuelli
ORIGINAL: RGIJN
aerial recon is now allocated to more than a dozen of my bases (Rabaul, Hoskins, Gasmata, Madang, Saidor, Wewak, Shortlands, Vila, Munda, Russells, Rennell, Tulagi, Lunga and Irau), carried out with planes of any kind.
So many targets but only few time left....[:(]
Oh, I forgot Nevea (which you reconnoitered) and Truk and Kavieng (which you did not...) [;)]
But I´m gonna help you with some nice pictures...
Kavieng - free intel part. 1
See here for some very valuable informations about my base at the Northern tip of New Ireland [:D] [:)]
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- kavieng_complete.jpg (33.52 KiB) Viewed 276 times
Truk - free intel part. 2
only a small piece of my very own "Pearl Harbour" main staging base... [:D]
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- truk_harbourDublon.jpg (116.53 KiB) Viewed 278 times
Truk - free intel part. 3
BTW, this is the entrance to my bedroom at my Truk HQ... [;)] The roof is made of very thick reinforced concrete (same concept as the german Uboat bunkers in France...) to prevent disturbing my much needed sleep [>:]
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- TrukPicA.jpg (44.14 KiB) Viewed 278 times
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AbeSimpson
- Posts: 151
- Joined: Mon Jun 23, 2008 12:30 pm
RE: Truk - free intel part. 3
Hmmm, white blankets in front of your HQs bedroom........... smells like surrender [:D]
I think I understand what military fame is; to be killed on the field of battle and have your name misspelled in the newspapers.
William Tecumseh Sherman
William Tecumseh Sherman
RE: Truk - free intel part. 3
The picture from Truk looks like someone was faster than me....[X(]
RE: Truk - free intel part. 3
The last two days brought a little bit action into the dull reconnaissance duty. A barge TF was trashed at rennel and for the first time an escorted strike hit a transport TF at Rabaul. 50 P47D met about 110 AC on CAP. Result was impressive: Downed about 60 enemy fighters for the loss of three. One AP reported sunk two other and a TK heavily damaged. A PG is supposed to be vaporised. Unfortunately the participation of my bombers was lacking as often. Only 20% took of....[8|]Before you start making assumptions: Enough baseforce, enough support (Air HQ present) enough supplies all crews rested and motivated.
RE: Truk - free intel part. 3
outnumbered 2-1, and inflict 20-1 losses. Congradulations! But yet another example of something I hope Matrix looks at.
RE: Truk - free intel part. 3
ORIGINAL: borner
outnumbered 2-1, and inflict 20-1 losses. Congradulations! But yet another example of something I hope Matrix looks at.
Taking a look at the details I do not see very much of a problem here. First of all about 40 Tonys left the fighting after the first was shoot down. That happened quiet early in the fight. After that it was 70 to 50. I assume that the Japanese pilots were more or less medium or low experienced (RGIJN please correct me if I´m wrong) while my pilot were already cracks. These units come in with 70+.
Now taking into account that one side has better weapons + better armour then it is not surprising that the one side will score only very few mortal hits while the other side will score a lot. Its just like 50 Tiger tanks take on 70 lets say Pzkw IVD. I´m sure the outcome would be disastrous for the latter. (I took two German types by purpose to prevent any "my countries tanks are better then yours" discussions[;)])
20 to 1 seems high maybe it is too high for an average incident. But who knows if this was an average incident. There was an incident in Germany where P47 and P50 shoot down ME109 and FW190 while being slightly outnumbered and lost only two planes while the Germans were completely destroyed (don´t know the exact numbers). Surely you will find lots of these things happening during WW2 in different theaters.
I´m sure and agree that plane characteristics can always be a subject to slight changes. But still I do not see a real problem here.
RE: Truk - free intel part. 3
There was a very famous case on October 22nd 1944 when David McCampbell, the Essex airgroup commander, and his wingman who I think was called McCluskey attacked a force of about 60 Japanese planes. McCampbell shot down 9 of them in the one action (a record) and his wingman McCluskey got six others. THis was no fluke, as McCampbell also got seven Japanese planes during the Marianas Turkey shoot back in June '44.
The only other person to come close was Hans Joachim Marseille (aka 'The Star of Africa'), who, in June 1942 attacked a formation of 16 South African P40's over the Sahara desert and shot down six in as many minutes, including at least 3 aces. What marks this possibly above McCampbell and McCluskey as given above, is that he was fighting an elite SA unit rather than turkeys, and also he managed to bring down six fighter planes whilst expending no more than 150 rounds total in the entire combat (he was flying an Me109F at the time, a great plane but hampered by lack of punch which consisted of one slow-firing hub-mounted 20mm cannon & two light mg's in the cowling above)
The only other person to come close was Hans Joachim Marseille (aka 'The Star of Africa'), who, in June 1942 attacked a formation of 16 South African P40's over the Sahara desert and shot down six in as many minutes, including at least 3 aces. What marks this possibly above McCampbell and McCluskey as given above, is that he was fighting an elite SA unit rather than turkeys, and also he managed to bring down six fighter planes whilst expending no more than 150 rounds total in the entire combat (he was flying an Me109F at the time, a great plane but hampered by lack of punch which consisted of one slow-firing hub-mounted 20mm cannon & two light mg's in the cowling above)
RE: Truk - free intel part. 3
the usual barge huntung
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- barge_kill_20mm.jpg (42.86 KiB) Viewed 278 times
RE: Truk - free intel part. 3
ORIGINAL: AbeSimpson
Hmmm, white blankets in front of your HQs bedroom........... smells like surrender [:D]
no. it just "smells" like cleaning day in anticipation of an Imperial visit [;)]
RE: Truk - free intel part. 3
ORIGINAL: fuelli
The picture from Truk looks like someone was faster than me....[X(]
The secret is ... CAMOUFLAGE !
[:D]
RE: Truk - free intel part. 3
ORIGINAL: RGIJN
ORIGINAL: fuelli
The picture from Truk looks like someone was faster than me....[X(]
The secret is ... CAMOUFLAGE !
[:D]
If you do that kind of "camouflage" to all of your bases then my job is done here[;)]
Ki61 Hien / Tony
ORIGINAL: fuelli
about 40 Tonys left the fighting after the first was shoot down. That happened quiet early in the fight.
Somehow these Kawasaki Ki-61 Hien / Tony are rather impotent in UV anyway, though they were actually quite good fighters IRL. At least for IJA standards and compared with other "balsa" lightwight, no-punch and inflaming-soon types as the Ki-43 Hayabusa. I wonder if this particular A/C is modelled (slightly) too weak in the game?
Of course I am aware I´ll have to live with it as it is... [:(] (unless there is another patch looming...[;)])
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- Kawasaki_Ki61.jpg (51.33 KiB) Viewed 278 times
RE: Ki61 Hien / Tony
The Ki61 Hien/Tony was actually a rough copy of the Me109, in fact when it first appeared US observers were convinced the JAAF was actually using Messerschmitts! Actually the airframe is pretty much Japanese design, but the engine was a direct licenced copy of the inverted fuel-injection Daimler so used by the Me's, I do also believe this was the only water-cooled in-line fighter to go into large-scale service with the JAAF during WWII, but I could be wrong.
The Ki61 Hien is also an example of why the Japanese were doomed to loose the production war with the US. They had a fairly good engine there with a proven track-record, but they could never reproduce it properly in their factories with a result that the Tony always had loads of problems with it's 'unreliable' in-line engine and was never popular with either pilots or ground-crews, who hated the idea of a streamlined water-cooled engine. Also the planes tended to be delivered in a poor, unfinished or unreliable state from the factories so most went straight to the dump to await 'spare parts' which arrived at a trickle. It also goes to show that the Japanese had a very crude grasp of stockpiling spares and supplies, as once a plane was deemed 'unservicable' the Japanese always grounded it until the spares arrived from the Homeland, which could be months. nobody ever came up wtiht he idea of taking an inventory of what might be needed in advance and mass-advance order, or even keep a list of which planes were unreliable and waiting for which spares, and swap items around between planes (if necessary, canniabalise) to keep as many in the air as was possible.
For the record, I think the last production models (aka Swallows I think) were finished off with radial engines after the factory producing the in-line engines on mainland Japanes was bombed flat by B29's, & finally somebody had the good sense to marry up engineless airframes with a stockpile of old radial engines that were lying around somewhere in order to get somethign in the air
For the record, the Hien/Tony was an unpopular mount that never quite deserved its bad publicity or aura constantly sorrounding it. With the in-line engine it was quite fast, and unlike many other Jap fighters of the period actually had some armour plate, bullet-proof glass & self-sealing tanks from the word go. Also its in-line fuel-injection engine (when working) gave it a distinct edge above 25,000 feet particularly when up against US planes that still used the old-fashioned but more reliable float-carburettors.
Armament was quite good - early models had 4 x 12.7mm MG's (rough equivalent of the US 50's), later ones were able to take wing-mounted cannons.
The Ki61 Hien is also an example of why the Japanese were doomed to loose the production war with the US. They had a fairly good engine there with a proven track-record, but they could never reproduce it properly in their factories with a result that the Tony always had loads of problems with it's 'unreliable' in-line engine and was never popular with either pilots or ground-crews, who hated the idea of a streamlined water-cooled engine. Also the planes tended to be delivered in a poor, unfinished or unreliable state from the factories so most went straight to the dump to await 'spare parts' which arrived at a trickle. It also goes to show that the Japanese had a very crude grasp of stockpiling spares and supplies, as once a plane was deemed 'unservicable' the Japanese always grounded it until the spares arrived from the Homeland, which could be months. nobody ever came up wtiht he idea of taking an inventory of what might be needed in advance and mass-advance order, or even keep a list of which planes were unreliable and waiting for which spares, and swap items around between planes (if necessary, canniabalise) to keep as many in the air as was possible.
For the record, I think the last production models (aka Swallows I think) were finished off with radial engines after the factory producing the in-line engines on mainland Japanes was bombed flat by B29's, & finally somebody had the good sense to marry up engineless airframes with a stockpile of old radial engines that were lying around somewhere in order to get somethign in the air
For the record, the Hien/Tony was an unpopular mount that never quite deserved its bad publicity or aura constantly sorrounding it. With the in-line engine it was quite fast, and unlike many other Jap fighters of the period actually had some armour plate, bullet-proof glass & self-sealing tanks from the word go. Also its in-line fuel-injection engine (when working) gave it a distinct edge above 25,000 feet particularly when up against US planes that still used the old-fashioned but more reliable float-carburettors.
Armament was quite good - early models had 4 x 12.7mm MG's (rough equivalent of the US 50's), later ones were able to take wing-mounted cannons.