Dutch AVP Arend: Scenario 1 Exploits

[WEXF]

Details on the latest bombing attacks on the enemy ground troops at Bhamo were shared in the afternoon. There were a total of 5 morning attacks by 165 bombers. Included were Blenheim IV, Hudson IIIa, Hudson A29A and B-17E aircraft. All attacks were made at 4000' in "overcast" weather. No CAP was encountered and there were no indications of flak in any of the combat animations. Several of the bombers suffered some damage and 2 operational losses occurred. This screen is for the 4th attack by 70 bombers.

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Needless to say, the effectiveness of the attacks on the enemy in the jungle was hard to quantify. Results reported indicated that the attacks were made against all three of the known enemy units at Bhamo: 33 Division, 23 Tank Regiment and 3rd Ind. Mtn Gun Regiment. Four enemy squads were listed at "disabled" along with 7 Non-Combat and 2 vehicles. 1 vehicle was reported "destroyed". Command was hopeful that the actual results were more significant and likely caused increased fatigue and disruption on the enemy.
Command was encouraged by the lack of any enemy fighter CAP. It seems that the Allies have "air superiority in Burma. Not a single enemy fighter has appeared in Burma since 24Aug. On that date a sweep of Mandalay by 13 P-38E Lightnings fought successfully against 12 IJA Ki-44 IIa Tojo. This was the very first appearance of the advanced Tojo fighter.

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The Tojo fighters were from the 47th IF Chutai, the squadron that started with 9 Ki-44 early Tojo aircraft based at Canton.
Allied intel had recorded that 4 of the original Ki-44 Tojo had been lost by the enemy and that the action at Mandalay had resulted in 10 Ki-44 IIa being lost. (FOG not withstanding).

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[WEXF]

Looking at the 47th IF Chutai a bit closer shows that the squadron has a size of 12 changing to 30 in October 1943. The original pilots in the squadron were some of the best Japan had. Of course it was impossible to know whether any of the original pilots remained with the squadron when the action at Mandalay happened. Some may have been transferred to Training Command or other squadrons or lost in combat.

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Command closed the briefing commenting that the only other advance airframe so far seen anywhere was the Helen Ia. None had yet been seen in Burma. Based on what was known of the enemy R/D on future aircraft, Command was pretty comfortable that for the short term the air in Burma would be a dangerous place for the Japanese Army pilots.

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[WEXF]

The morning of 30Aug found the AF at Carnarvon 14%>L4. At briefings all across western and northern Australia, the big news was about an enemy morning air attack targeted at Broome on the north coast. 24 A6M2 Zero fighters, based at Koepang, attempted to "sweep" the airbase at Broome. Upon arrival the enemy was met by a CAP of 8 Allied aircraft. The enemy found more of a punch than they expected in their "Broome Sweep".

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Japanese Air Command probably did not expect to see 3 Spitfire Vc Trop fighters patrolling the skies over Broome. The results of the attack are not exactly known (FOW) but there is no doubt that the air was ruled by the Spitfires. The "Combat Animations" showed 5 Zeros destroyed, the "Combat Report" has 4 destroyed. In the Allied "Intel Report" lists 8 Zeros destroyed (6 A2A and 2 Ops). The enemy first encountered the Kittyhawks but when the Spitfires arrived they were a "gamechanger". Of the 24 Zeros that flew the mission only 11 made it through. Many used their ammo and fuel fighting the Kittyhawks and trying to evade the Spitfires.

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The attack was at 9000 feet. If it had been higher the results might have been different but one thing was certain, the Zero pilots at Koepang no longer could feel that they were in total control of the skies. This was the enemy's first encounter with the Spitfire. It was over an Allied base so it is likely that many of the Zero pilots were either killed or captured. One Kittyhawk was shot down but the pilot survived and there were many additional airframes in the pool. The Spitfires were armed with cannons so damaged Zeros could well have become operational losses trying to get back to base. To be sure, Japan could replace the airframes but the loss of some of their better pilots would hurt! There were only a few Spitfires in the Allied arsenal and everyone in Australia was thankful there were nearby.
A second briefing was scheduled for later in the day to cover the latest news on the bombing campaign in Burma.

[WEXF]

The briefing on the latest bombing runs in Burma, once again, showed that it is very hard to actually know what damage was happening to the enemy force. The totals of the reported damage was 1 Squad, 22 Non Combat and 2 engineers disabled, nothing destroyed. For the 3rd time more than 100 bombers hit the 3 Japanese units known to be at Bhamo (33rd Infantry Division, 23rd Tank Regiment and 3rd Ind Mtn Gun Regiment) in seven separate raids. Intel was showing 17980T, 143 Guns and 119 AFV.

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Forgetting FOW for a moment, the three units at full TOE would have 148 Guns and 176 Vehicles. We have no way of knowing if the units were at 100% TOE when they reached Bhamo. It is unlikely as they had been fighting for some time. A lost vehicle could be a tank or only a motorized support vehicle. A gun could be an AAMG or a larger size artillery piece. The numbers tell us that, at most, the units have lost only 5 guns and 57 vehicles.
One thing that is interesting is that, if you look closely at the screen shot you can see the small arrow on the enemy unit pointing to the NE. That is an indication that at least one of the Japanese units is currently in "move mode". All three could be, but at least one is.
The latest attacks happened in "overcast" skies and, once again, there was no enemy CAP or AA encountered. Command was considering bringing in another strike at a lower altitude in a hope of catching the "moving" enemy forces.
The briefing concluded with a general overview of how the war was going. The DEI had long ago been lost to the enemy. China is in terrible shape as supplies have basically run out. The Burma Road is closed and the trickle of supply being airlifted in is a drop in the empty bucket. India and Australia have not yet been invaded and the islands in the Pacific are generally holding out quite well. The string of bases from New Caledonia to Tahiti is intact and getting stronger every day.
Starting on September 1 the Allies have over 300 ships that are candidates for upgrades. The ships are of all types from BBs to cargo ships. One of the interesting upgrades is for cargo ships. Many are similar to the upgrade of the Dominion L Class.

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The time needed for the upgrade is only 10 days. One improvement is in the increase of AA from 4>36 by the replacement of Vickers AAMG by 20mm Oerlikon Guns. The main improvement is the addition of a 12pdr/20cwt HA MKI gun at the front of the ship. Previously, there had been no armament at that position. These changes will make the cargo ship a much more defendable vessel against enemy submarine surface attacks.

[WEXF]

Several more of the upgrades available to the Allies in September are worth looking at more closely. Three AMC can upgrade and become LSI(L).

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Making this change has its tradeoffs. All of the 6" guns are lost but replaced with fewer 4" guns. On the plus side there is a l700%) increase in AA capability (from 20>144) and the addition of more radar. The biggest plus is the doubling of the Troop Capacity from 600>1200. As the war goes on the Allies will need as much troop carrying capability as they can get. Another downside is that the upgrade requires 150 days and must be done in a port that has at least a shipyard 25, although the work does not have to be done in the SY.
Quite a few xAKL are also eligible for an upgrade in September. In the overall picture this upgrade might be considered small, but to the crews of these small ships the changes are really important.

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Prior to the upgrade the only armament on board these cargo ships were a few light Lewis MGs. For AA they had a ceiling of only 1700', basically useless against anything but an attacking torpedo plane at the end of its run. After the upgrade the AA rating goes from 4>26. The light MG are replaced with .5" Browning M2 MG that have a ceiling of 3600' and are 5 times more "effective" (bases on "effect" rating). Against surface targets both are almost useless but the new guns are quite a bit better. The big improvement is in the addition of the 12pdr dual purpose gun on the stern of the ship. With a range of 14,000 yards against a surface target and a ceiling of 32,800 feet against aircraft, it is not hard to understand why the crews of these ships would sleep just a bit better after the upgrade. The work only takes a week.
Command (me) has decided that these upgrades will be done ASAP.

[BBfanboy]

The real gain in the change from AMC to LSI(L) is the unload rate is doubled - just like the APs to APAs.

[WEXF]

The real gain in the change from AMC to LSI(L) is the unload rate is doubled - just like the APs to APAs.

I totally missed that point. Thanks for pointing it out.

[WEXF]

31Aug found the AF at Carnarvon 17%>L4. Progress remains slow but on schedule. The news on the latest bombing raids in Burma did not provide much. The weather at Bhamo was terrible, severe storms to be specific. The bombing crews did fly and dropped their payloads on the enemy in the jungle from only 3000 feet. Reports of damage to the enemy were sketchy and not very positive. The same 3 enemy units were at Bhamo and the "movement" indicator remains but little else was reported. The hope was that the disruption of the enemy had increased. Fortunately, no CAP or AA was encountered and only some minor damage to a few airframes occurred.

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There was some news about enemy activity around Koepang. Previous reports of increases submarine activity were confirmed by a search mission report from a Catalina I.

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It was thought that the enemy TF contained a number of "midget submarines" and likely larger "mother ships".

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Command stated that the presence of the small subs indicated that the enemy could well be planning some recon of various ports on the north coast. Command was confident that defenses in place would be able to handle any threat from these pesky ships. Since Koepang was quite a distance from the Australian coast the mini-subs would have to rely on their "mother ships" to transport them to their targets. Most of the coast was "shallow water" and Command felt there was a good chance that both the small subs and their transports would be detected and destroyed. Time would tell.

[WEXF]

Command decided that it was worth while to have a special briefing to detail some of the assets that were in place to deal with the threat of Japanese midget submarines.

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There were six potential targets for the enemy midget submarines. Command did not want to be specific on what assets were at each base, for security reasons, but it was pointed out that there were over 70 ships that would provide defenses at the 6 bases. Some of the ships were small but extremely effective against an enemy submarine. Two specific types of "motor launches" were outlined.

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While these ships were small, they had the ASW power to deal with any enemy sub located, especially in the shallow water of the north coast. In addition to the more than a dozen motor launches in the region, there were 9 minesweepers. several DD/KV and a variety of support vessels that would be able to reload all the small ships with ammunition of all types.

[WEXF]

1Sep42 found the AF at Carnarvon 20%>L4. But the big news at the briefing was about Burma and it was not good. A full slate of bombing runs had been ordered against the three enemy units known to be at Bhamo. The weather in the region was pretty good, not perfect but nothing that would have prevented the air strikes. What happened is a bit of a mystery to Command (Me). In the combat animations and report there was not a single air attack against Bhamo listed. not one! Here is the order for one of the squadrons ordered to attack Bhamo, a B-17 squadron.

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The squadron has 12 planes and 20% were ordered to "rest".
Here are the "pilot screens for before and after 31Aug.

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If you look at the "missions flown" before and after the activities of 31Aug it is clear that 10 of the pilots in the squadron flew on 31Aug. Did they just never "find" the target"?
I checked aircraft that flew from another base and found the same data. A bomber squadron from the Chinese AF was ordered on the same mission. It had 11 aircraft and 20% were ordered to rest. The pilot data shows that 9 pilots had flown a mission on 31Aug. No activity was reported in the combat report or animation. Is it possible that the missions were actually flown and found the target but just were not captured in the reporting of what happened?

[BBfanboy]

Seems most likely that bad weather at the time of the attack prevented the bombers from seeing the target. It also sometimes happens that if the enemy has a strong CAP up and the bombers are unescorted, they will abort the mission without trying to get over the target. The leader's stats are good enough that it should not have happened in this case.

[Yaab]

Not a PBEM player, but could it be the sync bug?

[WEXF]

Seems most likely that bad weather at the time of the attack prevented the bombers from seeing the target. It also sometimes happens that if the enemy has a strong CAP up and the bombers are unescorted, they will abort the mission without trying to get over the target. The leader's stats are good enough that it should not have happened in this case.

After looking at all of the possibilities I agree that it was the weather that prevented the bombers from seeing the target. I took another look at the combat replay and found this message.

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The screen shows that the AM "air mission" was based at Chittagong. I checked all of the bomber squadrons there and all showed increases in the missions flown by the pilots, so it seems clear that they took off but cancelled before they got to the target. If there is one thing that is a bit surprising it is that there were over 15 different squadrons ordered to bomb Bhamo. They flew from 4 different bases and all of them aborted the missions. I wonder if there is just a single "die roll" based on the weather in the target hex that could result in all missions being cancelled? If separate die rolls are done for each squadron based on their base location, pilot skills, commander capability coupled with the weather the odds of all the squadrons aborted would be quite high.
At the end of the day, the situation in Burma took a turn for the worse as the enemy tank regiment that had been at Bhamo had advanced and was now at the river line threatening one of the last supply lines to China and about to open the complete RR line to the Japanese.

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[Yaab]

Well, your B-17 pilots flew somewhere, and one of them even got a GndB skill upgrade LAST turn, so he dropped his bomb on SOMETHING.

It begs a question if your bombers came back with bombs, or the pilots jettisoned them somewhere. Was supply (bomb loadout) expended during this mission or not? So many questions.

[WEXF]

Well, your B-17 pilots flew somewhere, and one of them even got a GndB skill upgrade LAST turn, so he dropped his bomb on SOMETHING.

It begs a question if your bombers came back with bombs, or the pilots jettisoned them somewhere. Was supply (bomb loadout) expended during this mission or not? So many questions.

It is true that Jennings, L got an increase in his bombing skill from 69>70, even though his plane did not bomb the target assigned. Looking at the previous day most of the pilots got an increase in bombing skill but Jennings did not. My understanding of how the skill levels increase is that there things happening "under the hood" that generate "points" that eventually increase the skill level by 1 point. Many things add to the "points" other than actually bombing an assigned target. The higher a pilot's skill rating the more "points" are needed to go up by a point.

[BBfanboy]

Well, your B-17 pilots flew somewhere, and one of them even got a GndB skill upgrade LAST turn, so he dropped his bomb on SOMETHING.

It begs a question if your bombers came back with bombs, or the pilots jettisoned them somewhere. Was supply (bomb loadout) expended during this mission or not? So many questions.

It is true that Jennings, L got an increase in his bombing skill from 69>70, even though his plane did not bomb the target assigned. Looking at the previous day most of the pilots got an increase in bombing skill but Jennings did not. My understanding of how the skill levels increase is that there things happening "under the hood" that generate "points" that eventually increase the skill level by 1 point. Many things add to the "points" other than actually bombing an assigned target. The higher a pilot's skill rating the more "points" are needed to go up by a point.

Yes - skill points can rise without actual bombing taking place. In training with no aircraft serviceable, pilots can still increase their GrndB skill just by studying and using training aids on the ground.

[Yaab]

WEXF, sometimes weather over an enemy base improves between AM and PM phases. Seems you were really unlucky with the Bhamo weather

[WEXF]

WEXF, sometimes weather over an enemy base improves between AM and PM phases. Seems you were really unlucky with the Bhamo weather

What you say actually happened. There was another message that appeared in the PM phase saying "allied aircraft spotted over Bhamo". My guess is that because all of the ordered flights actually took off and aborted after the mission was on the way, there was not enough time for another strike to take place in the PM phase. If the original missions had never taken off in the AM, they might have flown in the PM after the weather improved.

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The activity in the PM was limited to recon flights. Notice in this screen shot that the tank regiment that eventually advanced to the river's edge had not yet moved.

[WEXF]

2Sep shows the AF at Carnarvon 23%>L4. At the morning briefing there was a report of an enemy air attack near Broome where 22 Betty bombers attacked a group of 3 Dutch PT Boats. Unfortunately only a single Kittyhawk fighter caught up to the unescorted bombers.

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Report of the attack in the combat summary showed no losses by either side.

The PT boats were armed with 2 12.7 Browning MG that certainly had the ability to hit the attacking bombers. The bombers also had a return flight of almost 500 miles so any damage caused by the PTs or the Kittyhawk could well have resulted in some operational losses for the enemy.
In Burma, bombing missions against the enemy in and around Bhamo were flown but the weather was "Thunderstorms" and the results were hard to evaluate.

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[WEXF]

3Sep found the AF at Carnarvon 26%>L4. The bombing runs scheduled against Bhamo again faced bad weather but some were able to fly and complete their missions, while others never took off. This turn a different message appeared in the "combat report:"Imphal air missions cancelled due to bad weather at base".

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Previously, the message displayed read: "Bhamo mission cancelled due to bad weather over target". It seems clear that this message indicates that planes took off but were recalled because of the weather over the target. The message received this turn indicates that because of bad weather at the base the bombers were stationed at the mission was cancelled before any aircraft took off.
Quite a few bombing missions took off from other bases than Imphal. Results against the enemy were, once again, very vague due to heavy storms. No CAP or AA was encountered. Indications are that the infantry and artillery at Bhamo are still moving NE. Other enemy units in the region seem stationary.
At Geraldton, the crew of Arend was told that their ship was about to be given a new assignment as part of the overall re-distribution of naval and air assets along the west coast of Australia. Speculation ran high, but no one really knew what was going to happen.