August 23, 1943
27 more mines swept at Soerabaja and the minefield symbol is gone.
On the approach to Ponape we found a sub and it is now gone
Submarine attack near Ponape at 119,114
Japanese Ships
SS I-175, hits 13, and is sunk
Allied Ships
DE Gilmore
DE Peary
DE Paul Jones
Sub slips beneath the waves
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Kusaie Island flipped at the start of the turn, engineers landing now
Invasion went in at Ponape, lots of enemy guns fired in the pre-invasion phase, but only 2 in the invasion phase
and no ground bombardment attack from the enemy. All my troops landed and have gobs of supply and will
attack today.
On the ground in Java, Madioen was taken, the enemy troops there can not retreat anywhere, so they get to die there.
Ground combat at Madioen (54,104)
Allied Deliberate attack
Attacking force 18777 troops, 237 guns, 1174 vehicles, Assault Value = 877
Defending force 10877 troops, 117 guns, 30 vehicles, Assault Value = 215
Allied adjusted assault: 510
Japanese adjusted defense: 181
Allied assault odds: 2 to 1 (fort level 0)
Allied forces CAPTURE Madioen !!!
Combat modifiers
Defender: terrain(+), disruption(-), preparation(-), fatigue(-)
experience(-)
Attacker:
Japanese ground losses:
792 casualties reported
Squads: 23 destroyed, 78 disabled
Non Combat: 15 destroyed, 10 disabled
Engineers: 29 destroyed, 0 disabled
Guns lost 58 (52 destroyed, 6 disabled)
Vehicles lost 14 (14 destroyed, 0 disabled)
Allied ground losses:
46 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 8 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 5 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled
Vehicles lost 19 (1 destroyed, 18 disabled)
Assaulting units:
1st Army Tank Regiment
32nd Infantry Division
192nd Tank Battalion
194th Tank Battalion
640th Tank Destroyer Battalion
2/9th Armoured Regiment
2/7th Armoured Regiment
4th Armoured Brigade
Defending units:
38th Division
18th Naval Guard Unit
11th Militia Regiment
89th Naval Guard Unit
39th/B Division
====================================
At Soerakarta he had moved some of the troops from Madioen and they were attacked.
Even at 4-1 odds they did not retreat.
Ground combat at Soerakarta (53,103)
Allied Deliberate attack
Attacking force 18651 troops, 223 guns, 212 vehicles, Assault Value = 825
Defending force 3856 troops, 39 guns, 17 vehicles, Assault Value = 72
Allied adjusted assault: 311
Japanese adjusted defense: 73
Allied assault odds: 4 to 1
Combat modifiers
Defender: terrain(+), preparation(-)
Attacker:
Japanese ground losses:
432 casualties reported
Squads: 12 destroyed, 12 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 5 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 4 disabled
Guns lost 2 (1 destroyed, 1 disabled)
Allied ground losses:
139 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 23 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 1 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled
Assaulting units:
1st Australian Division
1st Australian Para Battalion
4th Australian Division
148th Field Artillery Battalion
2nd Medium Regiment
Defending units:
39th/A Division
39th/C Division
================================
Night bombing of Truk will have to stop. He has put too many fighters up on CAP at night.
I will change that some when I get Ponape occupied and built up so I can fly day sweeps
That will lessen the number of fighters he can put up at night. I lost 9 B-24s over Truk last
turn, that is way too many to sustain.
Only my B-17s flew at night against Batavia doing no airfield damage.
I flew two squadrons on sweep, a P-38G and a P-47D25.
the P-38Gs did fair, but the P-47D25s did much better.
Tomorrow the big hammer will fall on Batavia. I have 3 squadrons of P-47D25s flying sweep,
2 P-38s squadrons escorting 72 B-24s and 36 B-17s on an airfield attack. If thing go mostly
right I should score big.
On the day I lost 14 fighters and he lost 48 fighters.
Weather again grounded all air attacks in Burma. Forecast is again, surprise, surprise, surprise, THUNDERSTORMS.
