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[Sheb]

Damn, no more updates for days. Well, I hope he use those days to craft a good strategy.

[Journier]

yes, i keep checking and checking and being thoroughly dissapoint.

[Erkki]

yes, i keep checking and checking and being thoroughly dissapoint.

Ha! Almost there, 3 more days! 

[Erkki]

May 9th

As Japanese reinforcements landed at Semarak march to reinforce siegers of Soerebaja and Batavia, its pretty silent.

First victim of a Japanese submarine in almost 2 weeks, a fleet oiler in full fuel load is hit twice and sunk by I-165 near Guadalcanal. What was it doing there?

G4Ms strike Rangoon again, 6 cargo ships take hits, xAK Nirvana sinking. Theres no sight of Enterprise! RAF refuses to fly. Tomorrow, we'll hit their airfield...

Japanese bombers raid Wuchow's airfield, and tadaa! Over 20 planes spotted down there, the lone I-15 defending the base is shot down. At least 2 P-39s and 2 I-15s are destroyed and many more aircraft damaged. Runway and airfield facilities hit hard. They probably cant fly out those planes now, so its time to hit the airfield tomorrow to keep killing those planes on the ground. 

[Hyo]

Why didn't you hit Rangoon's airfield in the first place? You knew there was a bunch of planes there; wouldn't it have been better to take them out instead of loitering time with the ports?

Also, does this mean that the Enterprise is finally, and I mean finally dead?

[Erkki]

Why didn't you hit Rangoon's airfield in the first place? You knew there was a bunch of planes there; wouldn't it have been better to take them out instead of loitering time with the ports?

Also, does this mean that the Enterprise is finally, and I mean finally dead?

I rather use the bombers against any war ship bigger than a DD than attack an airfield with no guarantees of hits. Those guys are trained in 4 skills(torpedo, skip, level, search), losing a single crew to AAA fire attacking an airfield is a crew trained half a year and wasted for practically nothing.

Yeah, looks like Enterprise is finally dead. Too tired to write May 10th's report, but CL Concorde made it 500nm from Solomons to Brisbane with 2 torpedo holes, to be hit 3 times and sunk by one of my subs camping the harbor approach. 

[Zrk2]

Why didn't you hit Rangoon's airfield in the first place? You knew there was a bunch of planes there; wouldn't it have been better to take them out instead of loitering time with the ports?

Also, does this mean that the Enterprise is finally, and I mean finally dead?

I rather use the bombers against any war ship bigger than a DD than attack an airfield with no guarantees of hits. Those guys are trained in 4 skills(torpedo, skip, level, search), losing a single crew to AAA fire attacking an airfield is a crew trained half a year and wasted for practically nothing.

Yeah, looks like Enterprise is finally dead. Too tired to write May 10th's report, but CL Concorde made it 500nm from Solomons to Brisbane with 2 torpedo holes, to be hit 3 times and sunk by one of my subs camping the harbor approach. 

That's absolutely hilarious. As well, it would probably make for a good book.

[Erkki]

May 10th

Rangoon: G4Ms bombing Rangoon hit 4 transports(at least 1 sunk) and multiple aircraft, at least one, identified a Hurricane, destroyed. We're bombing pretty high at 18,000ft so there arent many hits, but during last 5 days we've only lost 2 bombers, too.

South Pacific:

Japanese submarine off Brisbane catches CL Concorde and her escort corvette. 3 torpedo hits on her cause massive flooding and an internal explosion, sinking her. Hooray!

On the other hand B-17s and B-25s raid Medang again, destroying 10 Zeroes. I dont like this, the freaking bombers were there before Zeroes could even take off. 3 bombers hit by flak, but as usually I dont think those hits ever result in writeoffs or ops losses.

[Erkki]

May 11th

7 days to CVE Unyo, and 9 days to BB Yamato! I'm starting the construction of CV Aso, so now there are a total of 7 CVs being built(Hiyo, Taiho, Unruy, Amagi, Kasagi, Katsuragi, Aso), first of them (Hiyo) available in 36 days.

Shinano and 6 submarines have been aborted to allow their preliminary and accelerated construction, and some merchant shipyards have been converted to Naval yards.

[Erkki]

Also CVE Taiyo's 3 air groups(12 Zero, 12 D3A, 3 B5N) have finished their carrier training. A little oops though: it doesnt carry any torpedoes(or facilities they need) so that mini sized B5N unit is useless. B5Ns dumped, she now heads for Singapore to join the Carrier Division III. She has a cruise speed of 15 knots so shes on par with most other carriers, and her low top (sustainable) speed of 21 knots doesnt matter that much, as CarDiv III is already slow at max 25 knots and is designed to be used in roles where the top speed is not required any way.

Forgot to mention that the Unyo is also a Taiyo-class escort carrier, she comes with no air groups so we're back to training... But first she will transfer a Ki-45 unit, or two, to New Guinea.

[Hyo]

What does converting merchant shipyards into into naval yards do? Other than the presumable boost to construction in some way.

Also, I wonder if our new CV will be able to see service, or whether the Allies would overrun us by then... *shudder*

[Erkki]

What does converting merchant shipyards into into naval yards do? Other than the presumable boost to construction in some way.

Also, I wonder if our new CV will be able to see service, or whether the Allies would overrun us by then... *shudder*

Merchant yards build cargo and utility ships, barges, landing craft, CVEs etc. while Naval yards build actual ships of war, CV/CVLs and submarines.

By early June 1943 we should have 3 new CVs(Hiyo in 35 days, Taiho in March or April 43, Unryu in late May or early June 43). Rest will come some later depending on a lot of things, but I'm ready to abort more submarines, or even cruisers. Once the super battleships are finished theres a lot of construction capacity freed, and the nearly useless Shinano is already cancelled.

[Erkki]

May 12th

China:

Wenchow falls!

Also, scouting attacks find out the 5 Chinese corps defending Anking are now running low on supplies. They have been cut off soon 2 weeks... Our supply line is a long dirt road but thats better than hundreds of kms of woods and wilderness. Reinforcements arrive in 10 days, we'll try to take the city then.

Submarines:

2 Japanese submarines catch what is apparently a supply convoy returning from Dutch Harbor, an xAKL is sunk with a deck gun and a large xAK hit with a torpedo. Most probably, it went down already.

Aerial patrols reveal EIGHT Allied submarines around Rabaul. 4 of them get attacked, and one is reported to have been hit. I dont need to resupply Rabaul any soon, what there is now will probably last for half a year, and if he likes to keep his subs under my air-ASW umbrella of special trained pilots, thats fine to me...

[Erkki]

May 13th

Not much action. Reinforcements should reach Soerebaja tomorrow, assault planned for 15th.

Japanese submarines find and sink 2 transports: one near Tasmania, the other off Indian coast. Allied submarines, other than the ones near Rabaul and one that has now long patrolled the China Sea, havent been too active for a month now. Their last kill was over a month ago in the North China Sea where a lone small cargo ship was sunk off the Korean coast.

B-17s night bomb Rabaul and destroy 7 bombers and 2 Zeroes. I'm discussing night bombing rules with my opponent, this will not do. Those attacks are uninterceptable and they seem to hit (airfields) as if it was daylight.

[Hyo]

But, that's like cheating, isn't it? If the RL Japanese had to suffer from those bombing raids, by all means, you should righteously suffer too, eh?

In any case, what about the submarine blockade on the home islands? How is that going?