Ron Saueracker
Posts: 12121
Joined: 1/28/2002
From: Ottawa, Canada OR Zakynthos Island, Greece
Status: offline
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Sounds like there should be a USN Sub Doctrine ON/OFF toggle added like the one for IJN if there is not already one.
What is with the "Happy Time" enjoyed by the Silent Service in this game as posted in AARs? According to Clay Blair Jr. and JANAC, in all of 1942, 350 patrols were carried out by the USN sub force operating from Pearl Harbour, Australia, and the PI/Malay Barrier and only 180 ships were sunk for a total of 725,000 tons. "This figure was about equal to what thirty-eight German U-Boats in the Atlantic sank during the 2 months of February and March 1942."
Forty -five percent of these sinkings were accomplished by fifty-four patrols sent to the coast of Japan and the Luzon Straits off the northern Phillipines. Very little was accomplished during the blockade of Truk and patrols to the Solomons due to the constant chasing of Ultra contacts of fast moving, heavily escorted warships and patrolling highly defended points of concentration where adequate defenses could be readily brought to bear (TRUK).
Blame lies squarely on three things as Blair points out. Poor torpedo performance, poor skipper performance, and poor leadership at the highest levels of command within the submarine force resulting in a failure to unify strategy in the Pacific in 1942.
Poor torpedo performance negated the efforts of the few aggressive early USN sub drivers. Morale was adversely affected by spending an average of sixty days on patrol and risking the boat and lives of the crew on torpedoes which did not detonate or ran too deep, only to be admonished upon returning with no results by their myopic superiors (ie, Ralph Christie). This applied primarily to fleet boats armed with Mk 14s, not S-Boats armed with Mk 10s, but the mechanical failings of the S-Boats were enough to limit their performance. Not corrected until mid 1943.
Poor skipper performance. The older sub skippers with which the Silent Service started the war were a sad lot by the most part. Career oriented, they were prone to concerning themselves with anachronistic efforts such as spit and polish and maintaining spotless peacetime career standards, and were hampered by flawed pre war tactical assumptions like the effectiveness of the submerged sonar attack conducted well below periscope depth. The advanced age of prewar skippers also proved detrimental as the stresses inherant to the submarine force resulted in many being relieved for health reasons, causing a strain on the command structure and resulting in more time spent in port pending a change of command.
A unified offensive strategy aimed at the destruction of merchant shipping, instead of using subs "willy nilly" to defend against invasions (with massive ASW escort), on commando raids, for transport, supply, and evacuation missions, for chasing Ultras, minelaying missions etc.
Mogami pointed out that USN S-Boats have been behaving like a German wolfpack in his AAR. Given USN sub doctrine, that being with few exceptions US subs were given individual patrol areas (until trios of subs were sent out to try their hand at Doenitz's wolfpack tactics in 44/45) to reduce the chance of any friendly fire incidents between subs, the chances of coordinated attacks by US subs as witnessed by Mogami were less than nil.
Clay Blair concludes that the USN submarine offensive in 1942 was a failure. This is not even remotely reflected in these AARs. Once again, perhaps the game needs a USN 1942 Historical Sub Doctrine ON/OFF toggle, to complement the IJN one.
Just my $.02CDN.
:p
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  Yammas from The Apo-Tiki Lounge. Future site of WITP AE benders! And then the s--t hit the fan
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