Right at the beginning of the turn, another of my cripples in the Indian Ocean sank: "DD Meredith sinks - LTC Hirabayashi is killed". Hmmm - that's right, I did get a number of Japanese commanders for the early TFs that I put together. I just didn’t happen to catch if any other of them "went down with the ship" - the Allied ships that is. This could turn out to be "The Secret Weapon that Won the War"…maybe I'll make more of my cripples into TFs, see if they also get Japanese commanders, and sail them into "harm's way".
Kidding aside, the air war heated up again this turn. PzB is determined to run me out of planes. I'm equally determined to run him out of air bases. Here's some of how it went this time:
Day Air attack on Bombay, at 20, 10
Japanese aircraft
A6M2 Zero x 15
Ki-43-Ib Oscar x 5
Allied aircraft
Blenheim IV x 11
Wellington III x 37
Hudson I x 10
B-24D Liberator x 20
Japanese aircraft losses
A6M2 Zero: 5 destroyed, 2 damaged
Ki-43-Ib Oscar: 9 destroyed, 7 damaged
Allied aircraft losses
Wellington III: 7 destroyed, 3 damaged
Hudson I: 2 destroyed
B-24D Liberator: 6 damaged
Japanese Ships
AP Atsuta Maru, Bomb hits 2, on fire, heavy damage
AP Tatsutake Maru, Bomb hits 1, on fire, heavy damage
Japanese ground losses:
612 casualties reported
Guns lost 2
Airbase hits 8
Airbase supply hits 4
Runway hits 32
Port fuel hits 1
Port supply hits 1
This time I'm going in with everything after the airfield. I'll rest the port bombers for a turn.
In Java, on the other hand, I can't reach his air bases, so PzB gets to send in big attacks:
Day Air attack on Bandoeng, at 19, 61
Japanese aircraft
A6M2 Zero x 39
A6M3 Zero x 22
Ki-21 Sally x 77
Ki-49 Helen x 20
Allied aircraft
F4F-4 Wildcat x 27
Kittyhawk I x 11
Japanese aircraft losses
A6M2 Zero: 31 destroyed
A6M3 Zero: 16 destroyed
Ki-21 Sally: 20 destroyed, 7 damaged
Ki-49 Helen: 2 destroyed, 2 damaged
Allied aircraft losses
F4F-4 Wildcat: 24 destroyed, 4 damaged
Kittyhawk I: 11 destroyed, 4 damaged
SBD Dauntless: 1 destroyed, 5 damaged
B-25C Mitchell: 3 destroyed, 9 damaged
TBD Devastator: 2 destroyed
Airbase hits 4
Runway hits 10
And:
Day Air attack on Tjilitjap, at 19, 62
Japanese aircraft
A6M2 Zero x 72
Ki-21 Sally x 80
Allied aircraft
Fulmar x 4
P-40B Tomahawk x 7
Japanese aircraft losses
A6M2 Zero: 1 damaged
Ki-21 Sally: 10 destroyed, 33 damaged
Allied aircraft losses
Fulmar: 7 destroyed, 7 damaged
P-40B Tomahawk: 12 destroyed, 8 damaged
P-40E Warhawk: 1 destroyed, 2 damaged
Allied Ships
AK Forbes Hauptmann, Bomb hits 1, on fire
AP American Legion, Bomb hits 1
DD Van Galen, Bomb hits 1
Allied ground losses:
6 casualties reported
Airbase hits 5
Airbase supply hits 3
Runway hits 6
Port hits 2
Realistically, there is nothing that I'm going to be able to do against that many Zeros.
On the other hand, it is hard to knock everything out at an airbase:
Day Air attack on TF at 23, 60
Allied aircraft
F4F-4 Wildcat x 13
SBD Dauntless x 16
Kittyhawk I x 4
Allied aircraft losses
SBD Dauntless: 11 damaged
Japanese Ships
CA Nachi, Bomb hits 1
CA Mogami
CA Ashigara
CA Atago, Bomb hits 2
Maybe this will slow down his bombardments.
The big disappointment of the day was the "debut" of my B-17s out of Tarawa:
Day Air attack on Maloelap, at 82, 81
Japanese aircraft
no flights
Allied aircraft
F-5A Lightning x 3
B-17E Fortress x 30
Japanese aircraft losses
No Japanese losses
Allied aircraft losses
F-5A Lightning: 2 damaged
B-17E Fortress: 2 destroyed, 18 damaged
Japanese ground losses:
5 casualties reported
Runway hits 4
Obviously, those boys will have to spend a lot more time on "naval search" before they are any good for bombing.
On the other hand, the attack on Buna went much better:
Day Air attack on Buna, at 55, 90
Allied aircraft
Wirraway x 9
B-26B Marauder x 40
Allied aircraft losses
B-26B Marauder: 5 damaged
Japanese ground losses:
24 casualties reported
Airbase hits 5
Runway hits 16
But then, I suspect that these guys had practice against Lae before I took over.
There was a ton of other air actions this turn, particularly in China. But if you seen Japanese planes bomb Chinese peasant soldiers once, you've seen it a million times, so I won't bore you with it.
On the ground, Ahmadabad withstood another "deliberate" attack, as did Delhi. But my "tit-for-tat" in India worked:
Ground combat at Rawalpindi
Allied Deliberate attack
Attacking force 408 troops, 14 guns, 0 vehicles
Defending force 0 troops, 0 guns, 0 vehicles
Allied assault odds: 3 to 1 (fort level 0)
Allied forces CAPTURE Rawalpindi base!!!
This was important because without having an uncontested base to move to, I couldn't move any of my troops in Delhi. (The "move one hex at a time" rule-of-thumb usually doesn't work, and didn't work here.) Now, I should be able to move my depleted troops out before they are forced out in a retreat.
Dave Baranyi
. Sending ships to Batavia means that he is reinforcing that place, isn´t it?. Java is the objective! 