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Prince of Eckmühl -> RE: Carriers when? (4/30/2007 5:32:10 PM)
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AS A GAMER, knowing what I know, before the Essex-class and escorts are bristling with 40mm bofors/proximity range ammo, I take the IJN in a game.
I do so because of the superior range of it's scout, strike and fighter a/c.
My strategy is based on getting in the first hack, hopefully before the U.S. launches a strike of its own.
After large numbers of Essex are deployed, this part of the war belongs to the U.S.
And there is no greater of confluence of incompetence and bad-luck to be found than the Pearl Harbor debacle.
Now, there's an if...
What if 150-200 U.S. fighters had been cruising at 10,000ft when the Japanese strike force arrived?
The IJN would still have inflicted major losses on the anchored fleet, but they would have likely suffered MASSIVE losses among their strike force, putting them at a disadvantage in coming operations.
And what if the U.S. had discovered the intended raid early enough for the fleet to have sortied? LOL, they'd probably all have been sunk, a la the Repulse and Prince of Wales!!!
Luck played a big role in WW2, certainly.
That torpedo that disabled the Bismark is proof enough of that, but intel won the battle of Midway.
It could have gone the other way, but the U.S. would have had to botch the job far more completely than anything else that they had done to date, IMHO.
PoE (aka ivanmoe)
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