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Bullwinkle58 -> RE: Nothing Up My Sleeve: Magical Moose Tricks--Bullwinkle58 vs.1EyedJacks (1/11/2013 3:09:07 PM)
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February 8, 1942
Air Experiments
Some days see titanic battles, and some days see me trying new stuff out just because. There are areas of the game I'm pretty good at, and areas which have never interested me much and I'm pretty bad at. Playing the AI it was fine to not care, but now I'm seeing that I need to be at least average everywhere.
Also, one of the core reasons I do this AAR is to provide an historical diary for my opponent to look at afterward, per his request. When he reads this (years from now I hope; do we have hoverboards yet?) I hope he recalls this day or this period of the war. I believe he keeps local notes in text files as his AAR is not a daily, so perhaps those help too.
Anyway, some stuff happened, and then I'll get to the air ops.
1) USS Tarpon in the Sea of Japan attacks another unescorted ship, xAK Yamaura Maru. Misses, not duds. Sooner or later those independent variable rolls will work in her favor. In the meantime, where's that guy who said SoJ patrols were a waste of time because there's no ships there?
2) S-23 goes into Johnson I. for the daily inventory on Fuso (yep, still there) and gets pounded. Harbor attacks have been pretty unproductive for both sides for weeks now and I think I'm going to stop them. S-23 loooked pretty bad with at least one penetrating hit and a fire.
The rest of the day is all air ops; there are no land battles at all, although Mike's transmission e-mail indicated he thought things in Malaysia and Burma were getting hot.
As background to what happened let me lay a foundation. Many US air units have come through CT. Many players send them to India, but I have sent most to Palembang, Batavia, Soerbaja and Cocos, with one patrol unit at DG. Reasons were several: 1) that is where the war is right now, not months from now, 2) the pace of Japanese ops tells me that if India is ever threatened it will be after the intial dearth of British aircraft is easing, 3) I have a core war aim of denying petroleum as long as I can, 4) Singers situation, while dire in a supply sense, is far better than I had hoped in a land defense sense when I had to make CT deployment decisions about three game weeks ago. Additional aircraft in the Malaysia/Palembang sub-theater have the potential to really complicate matters right now and for at least the next month.
As for deployments, Batavia is acting as a holding pen, more or less. It has the TBs, except one 6-plane Albacore unit on ramp standby at Palembang. It has most of the surviving Dutch odd-lot except the patrol planes which are at Palembang still pulling the 223 RAF HQ out of Singers to shore up maintenance at P.
P. is the core AF. It has sufficient supply and is getting toward a balance on aviation support. It has lots of engineers who can repair ciirca 30 AF/runway per day, although forts building is lagging. Palembang is getting the denial treatment most Japanese players give Singers. Of the incoming CT planes, I put three Aircobras there, two B-26, and the 18-plane Vindicator unit. One half-eaten Banshee group rounds out the offensive roster.
Singers has had no planes for about three weeks. Fort building is off, and there are lots of engineers there in combat mode who keep the runway damage down, which doesn't cost supplies and so is "free" except for fatigue and morale if they are bombed.
The Japanese in my view had gotten somewhat complacent. Milk runs on Singers without fighters. Lots of AA at Singers and no CAP for weeks, so this is somewhat understandable. Palembang still gets many Zero sweeps from N. Borneo and then AF attacks, some escorted, some not. Extensive recon is seen daily on several Java bases, plus Oosthaven and Palembang: Glens, Babs, and Mavises. Djambi in past raids has had one Zero unit on CAP.
Today the Allies set things up to change from routine, with three objectives: 1) to hit Djambi oil in a multi-dimension attack structure and overcome the CAP, 2) to try to ambush non-escorted heavy bombers at Singers, 3) to test B-26 utility in very low altitude City attacks.
To these ends, one Aircobra unit is sent to Singers and CAPed at 12,000 to compromise between the aircraft's low-altitude band and the normal height for bombers here, about 10,000. At Palembang, the Vindicators are sent high to Oil bomb at 22,000, the Banshees at 24,000, while the B-26s are sent at 100 feet to do the same. One Aircobra unit is set on Djambi LRCAP at medium altitude, while the other is set to sweep at 19,000 as a sacrificial lamb to try to exhaust the Zeros in advance of the bombers. I know all of this will not coordinate, but I hope some of it will. Palembang itself is left without CAP. Two Hurricanes are still flying there, and they are sent with the Aircobra sweep. Above all, I want to learn more about land-based coordination and low-altitude B-26 results.
3) First comes the sweep at Djambi, which is at 19.000 feet. It IS sacrificial with 4 Cobras lost to no Zeros, but many, many passes are taken and about one-third of the Zeros have some damage reported in the captions, although no critical hits.
4) Then the heavy bombers hit an un-CAPed Palembang, and it is bad for the Allies:
Morning Air attack on Palembang , at 48,91
Weather in hex: Light cloud
Raid spotted at 12 NM, estimated altitude 14,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 3 minutes
Japanese aircraft
G4M1 Betty x 21
Ki-43-Ic Oscar x 12
Allied aircraft
no flights
Japanese aircraft losses
G4M1 Betty: 2 damaged
Allied aircraft losses
PBY-5 Catalina: 4 damaged
PBY-5 Catalina: 1 destroyed on ground
Hurricane IIb Trop: 2 damaged
Hurricane IIb Trop: 1 destroyed on ground
P-39D Airacobra: 7 damaged
P-39D Airacobra: 3 destroyed on ground
Albacore I: 1 damaged
Albacore I: 1 destroyed on ground
B-26 Marauder: 1 damaged
B-26 Marauder: 1 destroyed on ground
Allied ground losses:
5 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 1 disabled
Airbase hits 4
Runway hits 27
5) Things improve a bit as Nells come without escort to hit Singers. Thirteen Aircobras get up and destroy two with no losses. This CAP will be withdrawn both for supply reasons and that tomorrow all raids will be escorted. Mike does not make the same mistake twice when it comes to air planning.
6) A second raid comes at Singers, with Nate escort. These crates are more of an fair fight for the Cobras:
Morning Air attack on Singapore , at 50,84
Weather in hex: Thunderstorms
Raid detected at 37 NM, estimated altitude 11,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 10 minutes
Japanese aircraft
Ki-21-IIa Sally x 29
Ki-27b Nate x 12
Allied aircraft
P-39D Airacobra x 13
Japanese aircraft losses
Ki-21-IIa Sally: 1 destroyed, 12 damaged
Ki-27b Nate: 2 destroyed
No Allied losses
Airbase hits 2
Runway hits 5
7) A third, unescorted, raid on Singers:
Morning Air attack on Singapore , at 50,84
Weather in hex: Thunderstorms
Raid detected at 38 NM, estimated altitude 14,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 14 minutes
Japanese aircraft
G3M2 Nell x 3
G4M1 Betty x 27
Allied aircraft
P-39D Airacobra x 4
Japanese aircraft losses
G3M2 Nell: 1 damaged
G4M1 Betty: 1 destroyed, 14 damaged
No Allied losses
Allied ground losses:
14 casualties reported
Squads: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled
Non Combat: 0 destroyed, 2 disabled
Engineers: 0 destroyed, 0 disabled
Airbase hits 3
Runway hits 18
8) A final raid here is unopposed by fighters, but is hit by AA:
Morning Air attack on Singapore , at 50,84
Weather in hex: Thunderstorms
Raid detected at 40 NM, estimated altitude 15,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 11 minutes
Japanese aircraft
Ki-21-IIa Sally x 3
Japanese aircraft losses
Ki-21-IIa Sally: 1 damaged
Ki-21-IIa Sally: 1 destroyed by flak
Runway hits 1
I realize conbat reports are tedious; I provide them here only for diary documentation. My evaluation is that the CAP at Singers was a good investment; I wish I had sent the Djambi sweepers there as well.
9) Back at Djambi, the Oil attacks are a mixed bag, a C- at best.
The Vindicators are the worst, going in at 22,000. No LRCAP makes it and 12 Zeros jump them and slaughter them. Ten destroyed, one damaged, no hits.
The five Banshees bomb from 24,000 without loss and without hits.
The first B-26 unit, six planes, goes in at 100 feet. I was unsure what would happen. I did not know if they would act as attack bombers (if the code for ABs activates this early in the war), or simply as bombers. They do both bombing and strafing. I think a combo of the sweep and Vindicator attack has eaten up the Zeros' ops points as only one opposes the B-26s. They score 2 Oil point hits.
The second B-26 unit of five planes also faces one Zero, scores no hits, and has one damaged.
10) The area's air battles end with a large, 36-Zero sweep passing over Palembang and finding nothing to shoot at.
I learned some things today which I will try to use in the near future. My greatest regret is throwing away the Vindicators. Although they are a dead-end model they have some early utility in anti-shipping. I am happy at the overall results at Singers.
News Tidbits
Bataan Forts go to 4 and will stop there. Supplies are slightly under 20,000.
Unknown number of air transports are ambushed bringing something into Djambi.
Pearl has five BBs with zero damage, and about half the DDs through their first ASW upgrades. The CAs AA upgrades have a couple of weeks to run. One CV at San Diego still only has five Wildcats, but the other three could sortie today with full, rested air wings.
The first fuel convoys complete their round-trip to UK/EC and come into CT with some welcome fuel. Speed-grouping xAKs on this run is key; many days can be cut off the cycle.
USS Sculpin continues to limp home from her mine hit off Hokkaido.
The Americal Division TF links up with a strong ASW TF mid-transit to Pearl and goes to Full speed for the run past the subs. Once a third full division is defending Pearl I may consider a very strong port attack on Johnson with BBs and CAs. Even if I lose 2-3 BBs it would be worth it if I can get Fuso and perhaps a CA or two in return. In the back of my mind is the worry that the KB could still be over the horizon waiting for this move.
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