BoB - Kevin v Swift

[K.Pooley]

Summary

[K.Pooley]

11 Group Overview

Compare this with the same overview of turn 25 (post no.87 on page 3 above). The main points of interest (in no particular order) are:

[] Several Sector AFs still have the capacity to absorb considerable damage.

[] The British have made only minimal alterations to flak defences - Tangmere being the only major change.

[] I have a pretty poor recce view of the SECAFs, certainly compared to just 11 days ago, something that I need to rectify this turn.

[] Possibility the most important point is the withdrawl of fighters from 11 Group - down from 240 to 104. Where are they now? Unfortunately I have been lazy and have up-to-date pictures of hardly any AFs outside this area, so a thorough survey of all the Non-11 Group AFs also needs to be a priority.


Of course, the fact that most fighter squadrons have now been withdrawn from 11 Group's AOO makes things more difficult for me. Previously, and even when all seven Sector AFs had been abandoned, bombing them still did two things; it went towards scoring AS points, and it degraded the ability of the squadrons operating out of the SECAFs that they controlled. In order to cause the same amount of disruption I now need to bomb the 'new' fields as well.

[K.Pooley]

This survey is based on recce photos ranging from 1-day to several weeks old, but is obviously the only thing I have to go on for tomorrow's missions. Looking at this it is obvious that I have been slow to catch on to what Werner has been doing. While I was hammering 11 Group he has been pulling squadrons back on to the less damaged AFs in his rear. As you can see, his fighter force defending southern Britain is now concentrated in two areas, one just to the east of Bristol and the other a massive concentration around Cambridge and into East Anglia. What I need now is to work out a suitable strategy for taking Fighter Command on.

Edited to make the map a bit more manageable!

[K.Pooley]

THE STRATEGY what I have wrote
This was going to be one of those turns when I carefully worked out a detailed strategy, writing it up as I went along so as to give you all an insight into my thinking on the subject (ie show how clever I am). Unfortunately after two hours plotting and re-writing, but no saving (!!?!) a crash sent the lot tumbling off into the ether.

Since I really can't face the thought of re-doing the whole thing in detail, what you're getting is my carefully worked out strategy just described in less detail than I had planned. So it wasn't a complete waste, as I have the plan in my head. You will see the detail when I post the full list of the raids.

My Plan (in summary)
0600 Recce of all relevant radar sites and ALL AFs on the map above. All at max. altitude, but crucial targets to get at least one other aircraft assigned to them, at a lower level.

0730 Some decoy and diversionary raids at the SW and E fringes.

Also a complex 1-2-3 strike against Martlesham. 1st wave (high MOR/high EXP crews) at ultra-low level. 2nd wave (fighters) timed to meet aircraft taking off from the field. 3rd wave bombing from a more conventional height.

0900 onwards Attacks on 11 Group targets, targets chosen based on the chart above.

1200 Well-escorted attacks on AFs near the coast in radar-clear areas. To be allocated after the night raids (below) have been set up, using resources remaining.

1400 Full recce of everything targetted so far.

2000 onwards A series of night raids, against two distinct areas. The first will be low-level attacks against PRIAFs in the "Bristol Pocket", while the second will be made from more conventional heights against the Cambridge-East Anglia grouping. Cloud allowing there could be 20% illumination until 2230 tonight, so hopefully conditions for both navigation and bombing should be reasonable. It will be interesting to see which type of attack is most useful/less costly.

[K.Pooley]

The Raids

1 to 33
Radar and AF recces

34 to 36
Diversions

37 to 39
Martlesham

40 to 42
11 Group

43 to 46
High-level night raids against the Bristol pocket.

47 to 50
Low-level raids against the Cambridgeshire-Anglian pocket.

51 to 61
Raids around coast.

62 to 74
Post-strike recce.

[K.Pooley]

Turn 37

[K.Pooley]

AARs

[K.Pooley]

RADAR Coverage

[K.Pooley]

Summary

[K.Pooley]

Tommorow's plan is a bit radical. In addition to the usual low-level AF strikes I'm trying a number of even lower level night raids. Hopefully the damage done will outweigh losses due to flak, night-fighters, collisions and CFIT! I need to try something dramatically different, as the data (see graph above) supports my belief that I'll run out of aircraft, and experienced crews, before I get near a a VP win. No incremental strategy is going to work from this point.

Fingers crossed

[K.Pooley]

Turn 38

[K.Pooley]

RADAR

[K.Pooley]

AARs

[K.Pooley]

Summary






Not bad result as far as AF-pounding goes. 18 aircraft destroyed, 16 (um 14!) of them on the ground!

<Edited for dodgy arithmetic>

[K.Pooley]

Mission List

All bombing raids for tomorrow. All of the other raids are Recce ones aimed at AFs and radar.