Arakan 1945- In development

[Dixie]

On the north-eastern coast of the Bay of Bengal there lies the Arakan, a narrow strip of Burma between the Arakan Yomas mountain range and the sea. There were few settlements larger than villages in 1945 and few good harbours on this 400-mile stretch of shallow coast. A road runs down the coast but only in two places does it cross the 6,500ft mountains to connect the Arakan with the heart of Burma, the plateau which is drained by the Irwaddy River and it's tributaries.

The strategic value of the Arakan lay in it's position between Chittagong and Rangoon, the best ports in Eastern India and Burma respectively.

In the words of a man far cleverer than me, Now for something completely different.

A lot of the smaller scenarios focus on the US/Australian forces against the Japanese in either the South Pacific or (in AE) the Aleutians campaign. Instead I'm working on (what will hopefully be) a series of smaller campaigns based around the British campaign to retake Burma. The idea is to start with one scenario and build it up from there, the starting point is the 1945 amphibious camapign along the Arakan coastline.


The Arakan campaign has it roots back in September 1944 when 15 Corps began a limited offensive down the Mayu Peninsula. During the next few months there were rapid changes of plan, including a planned amphibious invasion of Rangoon in March 1945 through a lack of landing craft. Instead the planned offensive in the Arakan was scaled back and focused on preventing two Japanese divisions from reinforcing the Irwaddy front. In addition the other goal was to take Akyab to base RAF and USAAF transport aircraft to support 14th Army's drive trhough Burma.
Originally the invasion of Akyab was planned for Feb 1945, but in late December 1944 it was discovered that the majority of the Japanese garrison had been moved to block 15 Corps' overland attack. On the 27th December it was decided to bring the invasion forward to 3rd January instead.


The Commonwealth forces were involved in 6 seperate amphibious operations in the Jan-Mar 45 period. The rapidly changing plans meant that initially there were no large APAs available, in fact the few LCTs available to XV Corps were only in the Far East as they had been judged too decrepit to make the journey to the Med.

The principal Commonwealth land forces were 3 Commando Bde as well 25 and 26 Indian Divisions for the amphibious assaults. The Indian divisions had mixed training, some brigades were trained in amphibious training, but no training in beach assaults. The overland advance by XV corps was carried out primarily by 81 & 82 (West African) Divisions. The main Japanese defences were 2 divisions in the Arakan region.
The Allies had massive air superiority, 224 (Tactical) Group RAF was specifically assigned to support XV Corps.
In all the RAF commited 16 Squadrons to supporting the offensive as well as detachments of nightfighters and PR Spitfires and the USAAF 2nd Air Commando Gp.
2x Spitfire sqn (F), 3x Beaufighter Sqn (FB), 5x Thunderbolt Sqn (FB), 5x Dakota Sqn (TR), 2x Indian Hurrican Sqn (FB and TacR), 2x Beaufighter detachments (NF) and a PR Spitfire det.
The IJAAF in comparison was a much smaller force. I've found references to two (possibly three) Sentais as well as an OTU in Rangoon. Despite this the Japanese air forces did achieve some successes, including damaging a destroyer badly enough that she wasn't repaired.

If the Japanese were outmatched in aerial forces it was a bigger gulf in the naval forces, Japanese forces did not employ anything larger than MGBs and Japanese shipping was routinely mauled by Fairmile MLs manned by the Royal Indian Navy and Burma Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve. The area was generally unsuited to large warships, so instead the Indian sloops filled the roles of gunfire support for the invasions.
HMS Queen Elizabeth, and the escort carrier Ameer, were briefly used in the campaign for the invasion of Ramree Island but both were to play no further part after that invasion. The Arakan was primarily a camapign fought by the small ships of the Royal Navy and RIN, sloops, frigates and minesweepers.



Current Status
The RAF oob has been sorted, including the addition of a base at Maunghnama. Most airfields are being scaled back in size, Akyab, Ramree Island, Rangoon, Cox's Bazaar and Chittagong are going to be suitablr for offensive operations. All the others are being lowered to lvl 1 airfields.
The major units of the Allied navies (Sloops and bigger) have been sorted, with the correct captains as of 1st Jan 1945. Most ships will start at Chittagong, with the destroyers and cruisers etc at the main RN base at Trincomalee.
The Commonwealth land forces have had their leaders assigned, it's just a matter of placing them on the map. For ease of loading the amphibious elements will be based at Chittagong.



The intention is to represent the Indian forces with a middling experience level and a good morale, they've seen combat but their amphibious training is not of a high standard. The British Commando Brigade will have high morale and experience. Japanese forces will have high experience and morale, but will be understrength.
There will be enough shipping to lift no more than 2 Brigades at a time, roughly the amount that the British were able to shift at a single time. If it works as intended the Brits should be able to take the entire Arakan coastline if they hurry and don't lose too much shipping. I still need to find more details on the Japanese forces and the Commonwealth landing craft and minecraft involved.


That's all for now...

[moonraker65]

Look forward to this one Dixie [&o].

[Don Bowen]

I'd be very happy to see you naval OOB. Especially for amphib craft....

[JeffroK]

How will you mod the terrain to account for the mud!!!

[comte]

Sounds cool [8D]

[Dixie]

ORIGINAL: JeffK

How will you mod the terrain to account for the mud!!!

I'm not entirely sure at the moment, from memory the only way to mod such factors is through modding the pwhex file?

[berto]

ORIGINAL: Dixie
A lot of the smaller scenarios focus on the US/Australian forces against the Japanese in either the South Pacific or (in AE) the Aleutians campaign. Instead I'm working on (what will hopefully be) a series of smaller campaigns based around the British campaign to retake Burma. The idea is to start with one scenario and build it up from there, the starting point is the 1945 amphibious camapign along the Arakan coastline.

I'll be following this scenario development of yours with great interest. Between you and Andy Mac (anybody else?), your scenarios are nudging me closer to jumping off the fence and finally buying this (otherwise, without playable short-duration scenarios) monster of a game.

[Dixie]

Update- 12 July

Air Forces
The British/Indian air forces are in place. The squadrons are located as closely as possible to the airfields they occupied on Jan 1st 1945. This means that several locations have been rolled into the same place on the map, most notably the airfields around Chittagong where the Thunderbolts of 902 Wing were based. There are 5 seperate RAF Wings and a SCU (Servicing Commando Unit able to maintain a single squadron), as things stand that should be enough to allow enough excess AV support to move one wing forward at a time.

Naval
The major surface ships are also in the db, starting either at Trincomalee (fleet warships) or Chittagong (sloops, frigates and amphibious elements). Two new ship classes have been added, the Shoreham Class sloop and the LSI(L) Llanstephan Castle. I'm still researching the landing craft used in the campaign, I think I've got the numbers of the few LCI(L) that took part in the campaign. The Llanstephan Castle is a big ship, capable of lifting a good wedge of troops.

Ground
The next step is adding the Indian Divisions that took part in the camapign. These are going to be split into brigades. The initial Allied strength will be 6 Indian infantry brigades, 1 African infantry brigade and a British commando brigade with supporting arty etc. I'm not currently planning to add the African Divisions that took part in the overland camapign, it would probably skew the strength too far in the Brit favour (if they were to be added they would be permenantly restricted to stop ahistorical amphib ops with them).

Bases
The main bases for the Brits will be Trincomalee and Chittagong, there will be a small flow of fuel at Chittagong but not enough to maintain the fleet elements (destroyers etc) thus forcing the Brit player to withdraw the big ships to Ceylon between invasions for replenishment.
There will be a garrison at Trincomalee to prevent the Jap player from any invasions of Ceylon with barges [;)]

[DuckofTindalos]

Octuple Brownings, Dixie?

[Dixie]

ORIGINAL: Terminus

Octuple Brownings, Dixie?

Er, yes. Absolutley. [;)]


Memo to self, damn typos. Bugger... The bofors mounts are being removed as well, should've been more 20mm mounts.

[Andy Mac]

Just a tip for later AI design try to keep the units you want to use for tasks sensibly arraanged in the database
 
Trust me going searching for them when doing the AI is a major PITA
 
i.e. pick a range and then use that range for all LCU's for the scenario
 
whether you arrange them in the range by task, HQ or type is personal choice but try to keep the scenario units you are using to a sensible range
 
I didnt do this in the master campaign and regretted it when doing the Ai

[Dixie]

ORIGINAL: Andy Mac

Just a tip for later AI design try to keep the units you want to use for tasks sensibly arraanged in the database

Trust me going searching for them when doing the AI is a major PITA

i.e. pick a range and then use that range for all LCU's for the scenario

whether you arrange them in the range by task, HQ or type is personal choice but try to keep the scenario units you are using to a sensible range

I didnt do this in the master campaign and regretted it when doing the Ai

Good idea, I've shifted all my Indian units down the list to where several Russian LCUs used to be. I still have to work my way around the AI settings, hopefully it's easier than you make out [:'(]

[JWE]

ORIGINAL: Dixie
Good idea, I've shifted all my Indian units down the list to where several Russian LCUs used to be. I still have to work my way around the AI settings, hopefully it's easier than you make out [:'(]

Hi Martin,
There is this field in the editor data called attribute, it don't show up in the editor panels so you'll have to use witploadae, or something, to see it (it's field BI, if you are using Excel on a csv file). If the value is 32 or more, that means the unit is accessible to AI - kinda, sorta, maybe (cut-and-paste artifacts make a lot of units look like AI units when they are not). But is a unit has attribute less than 32, it means the AI ain't looking for it, so it's a good candidate for death and transfiguration.

Of course, if this is a non-AI scenario, then just kill the aeixxx-yyy stuff.

[Andy Mac]

??? Attribute 
 
the Ai is now scripted I was never even aware of the 32 issue ??

[Dixie]

So how do I manage the AI? Is it possible using just the AI tab in the editor?

[Andy Mac]

Thats how I do it

[Dixie]

Good to know.  I may have more questions at a later date, some might even be worthwhile questions...

[JWE]

ORIGINAL: Andy Mac
??? Attribute 
the Ai is now scripted I was never even aware of the 32 issue ??

Howdy,
It's not an issue at all, at all, just a trick I learned from Michaelm to help figure out wha s'up. He mentions it here, in post #3.
tm.asp?m=2414587&mpage=1&#2467005
Ciao.

[Dixie]

Work is still progressing, I've been working on the landing craft for the past few days.

5 LCI(L), 7 LCT, 1 LCH, 29 LCA, 38 LCM, 5 LCS. From the craft used for Op Dracula (invasion of Rangoon) I've worked out a provisional list of craft for the scenario. Several of these are confirmed as being present in the time frame covered whilst the rest are a best guess. Particularly the small LCA and LCM fall into the latter category [:D]
Still to add are the small ships; minesweepers, HDMLs and Fairmiles.


The Japanese land forces are also still under research, currently 54 Division is based at several locations spread along the coast. 55 Div arrives later, as they were slightly further inland, so there's the possibility of a Japanese counter attack if the Jap player is feeling aggresive... Both divisions arrive as the constituent regiments.
The Japanese air forces are currently just the 8th Sentai (Lily IIc), 50th Sentai (Frank) and 64th Sentai (Oscar IIb and IIIa) and the OTU 8th Rensei Hikotai (Tony Id) which was around the Rangoon area and took part in some defensive missions.
Still no Japanese naval forces yet. There are plans to give them some barges etc and see how they work in testing.

[Don Bowen]

I have a copy of:
http://www.amazon.com/British-Invasion- ... 423&sr=8-1

This gives details of the forces for the Rangoon and Malaya invasions. Not down to LCM or LCA but everything else.

Let me know if you want any research - but I will be out of town from early tomorrow morning for a week.