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IJNAF elite A6M2 Zero unit Chitose Ku S-1 or its detachments or division(s)

3 (42.9%)

a IJAAF Ki-43 unit in Indochina, to be used in China/East Indies(mostly)

1 (14.3%)

a IJAAF Ki-43 unit in Burma(at least initially)

3 (42.9%)

Total Members Voted: 7

Voting closed: May 04, 2014, 08:49:03 am

[Sheb]

Brilliant. That's going to be such a thorn in his side!

[Zrk2]

So we went one cruiser for a battleship and a battlecruiser? That sounds like a win to me.

Yeah. Repulse was actually much more powerful than Royal Sovereign. We'll soon see if IJN losses will be limited to Ashigara and 2 DDs...

Modern  battlecruiser and antiquated battleship, then?

Also, I like this plan a lot.

Spoiler: MRW (click to show/hide)

[Erkki]

March 2, 1942


China: the KMT force on the road to Ankang is retreated!

Ground combat at 83,45 (near Nanyang)
 
Japanese Deliberate attack
 
Attacking force 35693 troops, 280 guns, 215 vehicles, Assault Value = 1271
 
Defending force 21458 troops, 189 guns, 0 vehicles, Assault Value = 361
 
Japanese adjusted assault: 702
 
Allied adjusted defense: 340
 
Japanese assault odds: 2 to 1
 
Combat modifiers
Defender: terrain(+), disruption(-), experience(-)
Attacker:
 
Japanese ground losses:
      949 casualties reported
         Squads: 4 destroyed, 88 disabled
         Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 9 disabled
         Engineers: 0 destroyed, 4 disabled
 
Allied ground losses:
      3054 casualties reported
         Squads: 360 destroyed, 1 disabled
         Non Combat: 295 destroyed, 0 disabled
         Engineers: 9 destroyed, 2 disabled
      Guns lost 15 (14 destroyed, 1 disabled)
      Units retreated 4
 
Defeated Allied Units Retreating!
 
Assaulting units:
    36th Division
    12th Tank Regiment
    15th Tank Regiment
    116th Division
    15th Ind.Mixed Brigade
    58th Infantry Regiment
    China Expeditionary Army
 
Defending units:
    59th Chinese Corps
    45th Chinese Corps
    55th Chinese Corps
    75th Chinese Corps

Another Chinese Corps that has been reduced to a skeleton crew gets also routed near Changsha but the casualties arent quite as spectacular.

Burma: Ki-43s sweep Chittacong and Akyab and the tally is grim: 17 planes and 12 pilots are lost for only 12 Allied fighters. This despite half of the Allied fighters being puny Buffalos and IJAAF having, again, numerical superiority, as judging by combat reports the Allies dont seem to have a radar so their planes arrived to the fight in pairs and threes mostly.

Near Toungoo, an Indian brigade and 2 RAF base forces surrender to Imperial troops.

DEI: Kendari's bombers hit Soarabaja's port in hopes of catching a submarine... They kill off lots of motor launches, PT boats, small mine ships and a couple of larger gunboats and mine ships.

Japanese aircraft
      G3M2 Nell x 24
 
Japanese aircraft losses
      G3M2 Nell: 1 damaged
 
Allied Ships
      ARD Soerabaja KM, Bomb hits 5,  heavy fires,  heavy damage
      HDML P 23, Bomb hits 1, and is sunk
      CMc Soemenep, Bomb hits 1, and is sunk
      xAKL Kwangtung, Bomb hits 1,  on fire
      CM Krakatau, Bomb hits 3,  heavy fires,  heavy damage
      PC Zeeman, Bomb hits 1,  heavy fires,  heavy damage
      xAKL Benkalis, Bomb hits 1,  on fire,  heavy damage
      AMc MMS D, Bomb hits 1, and is sunk
      AMc Digoel, Bomb hits 1, and is sunk
      AMc Djampea, Bomb hits 1, and is sunk
      AMc MMS C, Bomb hits 1, and is sunk
      TM-4, Bomb hits 1, and is sunk
      TM-6, Bomb hits 1, and is sunk
      AMc Djombang, Bomb hits 1, and is sunk
      AM Pieter de Bitter, Bomb hits 1,  heavy fires
      AMc Salak, Bomb hits 1, and is sunk

Submarines: a Dutch sub appears in South China Sea and destroys a small merchant. IJN subs surprise by destroying an xAK near Brisbane(what was it doing in the Coral Sea, unescorted?) and another one on San Diego - Hawaii route. On NW Australian coast, a sub sights the withdrawing British fleet but its attack on a destroyer fails. Another submarine sights a large task force with all kinds of supports ships and merchants South of Pearl.

[Anvilfolk]

Nice, for basically no cost! How significant are those losses? What is the role of those ships?

[Sheb]

It really sucks that you don't seem to be able to win an air engagement though.

[Erkki]

Nice, for basically no cost! How significant are those losses? What is the role of those ships?

Oh you mean the coastal minesweepers, 2 motor launches, a small minelayer, a coastal cargo ship and 2 small civilian ships converted into gunboats? Allies will never run out of such vessels. I think they are there at Soarabaja mainly because they lack the endurance to cross the sea to Perth. That ARD(floating drydock) is important... Except that since its not going to go anywhere its basically useless.

It really sucks that you don't seem to be able to win an air engagement though.

Dunno, the early battles against AVG went pretty well. I'm keeping the pressure up tomorrow, but will try something else.


That Chinese army on the road to Ankang is pretty much screwed - bombers will keep them pinned down as the troops will now catch them again and retreat them for the 3rd time. They have little combat effectiveness left and the Ankang operation is proceeding nicely.

[Sheb]

Well, I meant "not anymore".

[Erkki]

March 3, 1942


China: bomb bomb...

Burma: Ki-43s and 9-plane squadron of Zeros sweep Cox's Bazar and catch the AVG. 1 Zero pilot is lost for 5 kills! However recon finds some ships at Akyab and G4Ms sortie and 6 planes are lost and they attack the target ship from astern and miss. The max. attack distance was 1 hex too far. A large enemy TF with large warships is sighted in the Gulf of Bengal...

DEI: IJ bombers hit the ports of Soerabaja and Batavia and sink some small ships.

South Pacific: 20 B-17s hit Port Moresby, score 5 hits and manage to have one destroyed. They fly at 10,000 so flak scored hits as did defending Zeros, twice.

[Erkki]

I'm sending Mutsu, Nagato and some CAs after this enemy force... I think they will bombard Port Blair tomorrow or the day after:



And heres a huge screenshot on South China Sea. This should demonstrate how vulnerable Japan's economy is: majority of Empire's oil wells, we are talking about 2/3 or more here, are at Palembang, lower left corner. Its own port is too small to load large task forces so if Japan wants to escorts its tankers well and put them into convoys, they need to be loaded one by one which takes time, or use small TFs to move oil and fuel first to Singapore and then to Japan. As you can see, just outside of Singapore is the open sea where the submarines can be anywhere and naval air search has very hard time keeping track of them due to the distance.

The whole area is basically 2 bottlenecks(Singapore area and Formosa Strait to the North) with a massive open gap between them through which sails nearly all of the precious oil, already refined fuel and resources to Japan's hungry industry, and supplies down to the front to be consumed by engineers, troops, ships and aircraft.

In ports and in task forces, that picture has 354 Japanese ships...

[Anvilfolk]

Holy cow, that screenshot reminds me of how insane playing a full campaign is. Look at all those units! On a tiny piece of map, compared to the whole thing! Glad there's someone to do the playing for me

[Erkki]

March 4, 1942


China: -

Burma: IJAAF sweeps Chittacong in force but the Allies have stood down their fighters... However over Akyab Ki-43s destroy 3 AVG Hawks. 86 have been destroyed so far - only 8 left.

The enemy task force in the Bay of Bengal moves slowly towards Ceylon.

DEI: bombers hit Soerabaja's port yet again and destroy more small ships... 3 submarines reported in port for the last 2 weeks. Trying to hit them...

A large enemy TF including battleships and CVs reported near Perth. Most probably CVL Hermes TF. They sailed over 11 submarines and none attacked...

South Pacific: Zeros swept Noumea from Luganville. 2 Zeros lost for 1 Wildcat and 2 P-40Bs. B-17s struck Port Moresby again with their bullshit gunners that outright destroyed 2 Zeros in the air without them getting even to fire, one pilot KIA... However the enemy again flew at low altitude and lost 2 B-17s to flak! And the airfield wasnt damaged. I hope the Allies will keep flying their heavies to Port Moresby 2-3 times a week for the following 2 years +.

Submarines: a very large IJN transport carrying an engineering unit to Truk is hit near Yokohama and turns back, looks like she'll make it. A small minesweeper on its way to Rangoon is destroyed by a British submarine near Singapore. Finally, IJN submarines between New Zealand and Australia find a tanker convoy and sink a VERY large tanker in full fuel load!

[Erkki]

I'm counting the troops for Ceylon operation... I could land nearly all troops directly at Trincomalee, which is the 2nd most important base on the island after Colombo, and has already a large port and airfield that can be used, unlike Jaffna and Konggala. Once it falls, Ceylon is pretty much screwed, as bombers and fighters can be flown in immediately and theres a good road across the island. Problem is that Trincomalee has a battery of coastal defense guns which would cause a lot of damage.

Another option would be to directly land at Colombo, which would be rather ballsy I guess and would need an extra day or two under Allied air search... But it has clear terrain that makes it much easier to take and just as many defensive guns as Trincomalee.

So... I'm thinking about embedding Mutsu and Nagato into the amphibious TF to soak up hits and suppress the guns, while there will be 2 or 3 surface action squadrons built around Yamato and 8 heavy cruisers. Carriers have capacity for 130 aircraft, and those planes could in an emergency be flown to a land base.

This time fuel wont be an issue - oilers have been loading fuel aboard at Palembang and there are already 2 large, escorted replenishment task forces fully loaded up with ~120,000 tons of fuel, currently under heavy air patrols, fighter CAP and behind surface anti-submarine patrols.

Surface units(except Yamato) have already been moved through Malacca strait and are now at Port Blair. There are some submarines in the strait that I need to smoke out with aircraft and surface patrols before the operation can begin... I dont want to have a carrier or a transport with thousands of men aboard sunk there, or give the enemy any warning.

[Anvilfolk]

What would be the disadvantages of unloading into an empty hex that doesn't have a base, adjacent to one of those major cities, and then moving the troops across? Would it make it easier to assault the cities (as compared to an amphibious landing)? Is the problem that it would delay the entire operation for a few days?

[Erkki]

What would be the disadvantages of unloading into an empty hex that doesn't have a base, adjacent to one of those major cities, and then moving the troops across? Would it make it easier to assault the cities (as compared to an amphibious landing)? Is the problem that it would delay the entire operation for a few days?

We have a house rule against non-basehex invasions and paratrooper landings. Makes it too easy to go around planned defenses and static coastal defense units when invading larger islands or continents.

Unloading supplies would be slower, there are lower troop stacking limits(usually) in non-base hexes and an airbase would only become available once the first base would be captured. So attacking Trincomalee or Colombo vs. an adjacent empty hex only avoids some losses from defensive fire on landing troops(likely to be very minor) while it loses a couple of days at least without a base and may give the enemy more time to fall back and regroup. In a direct landing the troops in the landing hex would not be able to get away.

[Anvilfolk]

Interesting! I was suggesting this because I assumed an amphibious landing in a hex with a base that has significant coastal defences would be very dangerous! Well, in that case I am looking forward to see what comes out of this massive push!