Oleg Mastruko
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Joined: 10/21/2000
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Again, by the same author, from Usenet. (See my previous post "Russians were a piece of cake..." for introduction.)
This one has some useful first hand observations that developers may use in WITP!
Again, I take no credit for the following article, I'm just redistributing it from the Usenet (posted 2,5 years ago under the handle "Convair Diver 880").
Please note the parts re railroads in North Australia, and the kind of supremacy Japanese enjoyed in those days according to this guy.
"The Japanese just did whatever the hell they wanted to in
those days and it seemed like no one could touch them."
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While the US had poured a good part of its air assets into Australia during the early months of 1942, the numbers may imply more capability than existed. For example, during this time, only the airfield at Katherine Field, 100 miles south of Darwin and Batchelor Field, 50 miles south and the RAAF base at
Darwin, could handle the B-17. The US aircraft had originally been intended for the Philippines and then were diverted to Australia, Brisbane and Townsville. Sometimes not all needed components arrived, some having already
been delivered to the PI, some having been sunk by the Japanese or just misplaced. Getting planes to Darwin was a major challenge, the route being a 400mile flight from Brisbane to Charleville, then a 550 mile flight to Cloncurry. It was easier from Townsville, a 400 mile flight following the railroad to Cloncurry. From there it was another 500 miles across the Outback
to Daly Waters, then a hop to Katherine and finally Darwin. The whole route was littered with broken down airplanes at the airfields, and along the way,and far off the way, airplanes that had got lost and crashed. Then there were the
frustrations, like the seemingly formidable force of dive bombers of the 27th that arrived in Darwin but then, once there, through some marvelous snafu, it was discovered they had no bomb sights. You would think someone would have
noticed before then. But no. So back they flew to Batchelor Field, completely useless. Naturally a lot of planes became write offs on the trip up and back.
There were plenty of other snafus. Like the 33rd, a P-40 outfit, bound for Java guided by a B-17. Their destination field was reported fogged in so they opted to wait for better weather before taking off from Darwin. The B-17 crew was
not about to hang around parked on the ground where they would be easy pickings for the Japanese and so took off and left the P-40s behind.
And the Japanese did show up and bombed the hell out of Darwin. Only one P-40 survived the attack, all the rest destroyed on the ground. That one P-40 scooted back to
Batchelor Field where sat parked the 16 flyable of the 27th's useless dive bombers. That was about the entire allied air force in that area. There had been a force of 140 P-40s committed to go up to Java and fight the Japs. About 3 dozen actually made it to Java, where they were all lost. A couple of dozen
were abandoned in crates in the Dutch Indies. About 3 dozen went down with the Langley. Most of the rest didn't make it along the trek from Brisbane or got blasted by the Japanese. Besides sweeping out Darwin, the Japanese wrecked
allied aviation at Broome. On one raid, a fighter sweep of just nine Zeros shot down a B-24 and a DC-3 flying in from Java, then strafed and destroyed on the ground another B-24, a DC-3, two B-17s, two Hudsons and 16 Catalinas and other seaplanes moored in the harbor. Broome was evacuated with the survivors
fleeing to Perth.
The Japanese just did whatever the hell they wanted to in
those days and it seemed like no one could touch them.
In another post I'll detail some of the difficulties in getting airplanes to Pt. Moresby and how the Japanese dealth with them.
Suffice it to say now that the number of airplanes available on paper in Australia and New Guinea in the time period leading up to the Coral Sea battle bears no relationship to the actual situation. The US naval victory at Coral Sea was a Godsend. The USAAF was just getting organized then and was very
vulnerable. The enormous obstacles to setting up operations in that region just aren't recognized. No maps for one thing. Then you had to set up airfields and fuel dumps, ammo dumps and repair depots and supply depots and get them manned and functioning. That took quite some time. Then you had to
get your airplanes up to the front and the squadrons organized and functioning.
In my view, had the Japanese kept the pressure on in that area of the world, and not run off to the Indian Ocean and Midway, they could have not only taken New Guinea but walked ashore anywhere in Australia from Cape York to Broome
without significant opposition. They might have even forced Australia out of the war. Who knows? But the US Navy stopped them in their tracks when nobody else could. I would never denigrate the contribution of the USN to halting the
Japanese cold and then rolling them right back to Tokyo.
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Another very interesting old post - 
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