RE: I Have Returned

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Taxcutter -> RE: I Have Returned (3/5/2021 8:08:43 PM)
Last report I mentioned that AI has upped his ASW game. I had two days like what Karl Doenitz is facing in the Atlantic. AI killed four boats in a single day and two more the next. And to add insult to injury he left a parade of beat-up boat limping back to Midway and Darwin. All this in deep water. Kamikazes force me to extravagantly escort every thing. Fortunately, I have enough B-24s to pulverize his bases. A kamikaze out of Makassar got a troop transport. After a couple days of hundreds of B-24 attention they are less of a problem. But now I have four ships in the Hong Kong shipyard for at least a couple weeks. At least my ships are in no danger in Hong Kong. Clouds of Corsairs and P-47s just run up kills on kamikazes.

Taxcutter -> RE: I Have Returned (3/6/2021 3:12:56 PM)
I have a carrier escort group heading toward Darwin. Six CVEs loaded with FM-2 fighters and 33 Hellcats. Very few Avengers. Have these escort my "Malta Convoys" Darwin to Hong Kong. When the kamikazes come out to play they meet 120 fighters with very experienced and well-trained aircrew. I may go with a improved version as soon as the Wasp gets out of drydock. She only carries 78 planes. Make 'em all fighters. I do have four Marine carrier-trained 18-plane fighter squadrons. Not ahistorical. As the war went on the air wings became more and more fighter-heavy to combat kamikazes. Now what do I do about my submarines?

Taxcutter -> RE: I Have Returned (3/17/2021 9:30:56 PM)
Sitrep Cinco de Mayo 1944 Satisfactory progress since last sitrep. Moulmein, Kendari, Ambon, Namlea, and the tough nut at Wotje have fallen. Doors are opening. I am running two "Malta Convoys" to and from Canton/Hong Kong at any given time. Between 100,000 tons a week through those two ports, 500/day over the Burma Road and whatever The Hump can chip in, the Chinese are pretty well supplied. The Japanese pocket outside Foochow is down to <1,000 troops (AV=3). I hope 80,000 Chinese can polish that one off shortly. Moulmein opens the door to Bangkok. I may be threatening that city within a week. I've taken Port Blair (mostly as a sub base for short-legged British subs to dominate the Malacca Strait down to Singapore. The plan is to render AI incapable of molesting my Rangoon convoys and I'll transfer the Tenth Air Force to SW Pacific to drive on Formosa. The Marines can get a rest. Kwaj, Roi-Namur and Eniwetok are garrisoned, but those invasions are scheduled to be Army shows. I already have troops planning to invade Saipan and Guam. B-29s are training in Hawaii. P-51Bs are appearing. I'm backing down my sub campaign. Targets are hard to find and those damn E-class escorts are murder on my subs. With Kendari fallen Makassar is the next place scheduled to waltz Matilda. That's the curtain-raiser for a campaign up the Makassar Straits (Balikpapan, Samarinda, and Tarakan). KB remains bottled up in Tokyo. I have five TF of two big carriers each. Fun times.

Taxcutter -> RE: I Have Returned (3/21/2021 2:33:28 AM)
The Duke of the Pacific (Taxcutter hisself) sent some combat cameramen to sail with cruisers operating in the DEI. Morale in the Silent Service were in the dumps. Aggressive skippers were getting pounded by "E" class escorts. COMSUBPAC pulled away from the outfalls of Kii Suido and Bungo Suido because of losses. Supporting the Hong Kong "Malta Convoys" I have inserted a bunch of Brooklyn and Cleveland class cruisers. This keeps my big convoys (typically 100,000 tons or so) from being molested by smaller surface ships and they also provide good flak support. (Most of these ships are due a 4/44 upgrade that will boost flak by ~50% but I mostly rely on Corsair cover to keep the kamikazes away.) Four times in the last couple days my cruisers have bumbled into convoys escorts by E escorts in the Davao area. The combat cameramen were stationed on the aft director and in the Seagull spotter planes. Needless to say the Brooklyns and Clevelands did exactly what they went designed to do. E-class escorts evaporated under the hail of 6" gunfire. Copies of the film were sent to sub bases at Midway, Darwin, and Milne Bay. At least the sub boys now know the skimmers have their backs. Nine E-class sunk in two days.

RangerJoe -> RE: I Have Returned (3/21/2021 2:48:58 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: Taxcutter The Duke of the Pacific (Taxcutter hisself) sent some combat cameramen to sail with cruisers operating in the DEI. Morale in the Silent Service were in the dumps. Aggressive skippers were getting pounded by "E" class escorts. COMSUBPAC pulled away from the outfalls of Kii Suido and Bungo Suido because of losses. Supporting the Hong Kong "Malta Convoys" I have inserted a bunch of Brooklyn and Cleveland class cruisers. This keeps my big convoys (typically 100,000 tons or so) from being molested by smaller surface ships and they also provide good flak support. (Most of these ships are due a 4/44 upgrade that will boost flak by ~50% but I mostly rely on Corsair cover to keep the kamikazes away.) Four times in the last couple days my cruisers have bumbled into convoys escorts by E escorts in the Davao area. The combat cameramen were stationed on the aft director and in the Seagull spotter planes. Needless to say the Brooklyns and Clevelands did exactly what they went designed to do. E-class escorts evaporated under the hail of 6" gunfire. Copies of the film were sent to sub bases at Midway, Darwin, and Milne Bay. At least the sub boys now know the skimmers have their backs. Nine E-class sunk in two days. Did Commander John Ford manage this production? Your subs can also lay minefields as well. The enemy might get a blast from those.

Taxcutter -> RE: I Have Returned (3/22/2021 2:44:02 PM)
The noose tightens around Japan's resources and oil coming from the DEI. My HEAVILY escorted "Malta Convoys" have lots of CVEs that have their own squadrons of TBDs. Now they prowl the South China Sea, fighters swarming to kill kamikazes and TBDs seeking merchant ships. The passage south of Davao swarms with subs and now cruisers. My airbase at Ambon provide Corsairs to fend off kamikazes. My latest convoy sailing from Darwin has lots of base forces and aircraft to cover the Formosa Straits with Marine Dauntlesses from bases in Amoy, Swatow, and Foochow. Won't need subs once I have enough dive bombers. Already I have enough fighters in China to reduce AI to nuisance night air raids.

Taxcutter -> RE: I Have Returned (4/5/2021 3:34:56 PM)
Taxcutter vs AI. Sitrep June 1, 1944 Admiral King was right. The distances are almost as much of an enemy as the Japanese. I am cleaning out the Marshalls. Two invasion TFs are en route to the two biggest prizes in the Marshalls - Roi-Namur and Kwajalein. Each is carrying a reinforced USA division (2 battalions armor and 1 regiment combat engineers.) While I was earlier pummelling Wotje, I reconned them thoroughly. An Army division should suffice for each but I do have two divisions fully prepped at Pearl in case some IJA escaped the gaze of my airedales. Next stop, Eniwetok. I have two divisions prepped for it. Units prepping for Wake, Ponape, and beginning to prep for the Marianas. Wotje put up a pretty good fight but isolated islands are tough to hold onto. I'm using bombardment TFs consisting of CVEs loaded with only SBDs and TBFs (one squadron of FM-2 as these TFs never venture out from under the protective CAP of five big CVs.) At Wotje that softened the island quite nicely. Should work at Roi and Kwaj. I have follow up TFs a couple days behind the assault TFs so I can free up my big CVs fairly quickly while the eternal ceremony of loading and unloading on small ports proceeds. I have Makassar invested from the land side and the Australian 6th and 9th divisions are enroute. I think I'm gonna reinforce the Aussies with TD battalions from the Central Pacific. I hate to see these excellent infantry formations wearing down because they don't have much firepower, and the TD are just sitting around. I have the 7th Division prepped for Balikpapan. Then the Makassar Strait will become the Taxcutter Strait. China is proceeding as fast as I can offload my mega-convoys. I have a small airbase at Wenchow and it should grow fairly soon. I have a huge army (6 corps) of Chiang's army bearing down on the lower Yangtze Valley. Having some surface action fun at Port Blair. Something about this rock goaded AI in action. His surface units had been hiding out for most of the game. I've had two surface engagements between various components of the British and Japanese BBs that usually never get into the game. Nagato and a Kongo slugging it out with two Queen Elizabeths and the Richilieu. Some damage but nothing that justifies pulling back. I have POW, Renown and Repulse (big flak refit finished) headed there to contest the island. AKE almost there to provide staying power. IJN surface units seem to be basing in Singapore. Why the hell not? I have the Malacca strait choked with RN "S" class subs. AI sinks those rust-buckets even easier than the Dutch subs. B-29s are at Lahaina training. If the land AI would watch its flanks this would be the best WitP AI ever.

Taxcutter -> RE: I Have Returned (4/10/2021 3:23:14 PM)
From reading these AARs, it seems that many players rarely venture deeper that the fall of 1942. There is a lot of interesting stuff going on in 1944.

Taxcutter -> RE: I Have Returned (4/11/2021 3:32:35 PM)
Sitrep June 16, 1944. Been two bad weeks for AI. Makassar fell after a two day fight. Roi-Namur fell in one day. Kwajalein fell in a two day massacre. The Indian Army has the RTA bottled up in Bangkok and a pocket at Chang Mai. The IJAAF base at Tavoy (plus 18,000 troops) is encircled. Merrill's Marauders and the Chindits are running amok in central Thighland. My British sub base at Port Blair is sorta operational. Chiang Kai-shek's army is at the doorstep of Shanghai but not in sufficient force for a coup de main. I have at least fighter bases at Wenchow, Foochow, and Amoy and a big base at Hong Kong. My last "Malta Convoy" was 500,000 tons and there is another en route. Chiang's army is now almost all 575 AV each. I'm building up a US army force to blitz Formosa. Gotta punch out Menado and take Puerto Princessa/Tay Tay to build an air base to neutralize Manila. Distances are a bigger enemy than the IJA. Big activity is moving peripheral operations to the main scene. I'm reducing all the island bases of the SouPac command to nominal garrisons (most ASW). I'm transferring the Tenth AF to SWPac to beef up control of the straits. I'm getting a couple of British divisions to garrison Hong Kong. Twentieth AF has already been transferred to Hawaii and is training B-29 crews at Lahaina til I grab the Marianas. Not all is sugar and spice. Two surface actions at Port Blair reduced PoW to floating junk. Repair estimate at Colombo was 154 days. That yard is too useful to fill up with one ship. PoW is headed to Blighty for repairs. She's probably out of the war. That battle wrecked Ise. I did spot her limping back to the Inland Sea. AI seems to have a bottomless pool of I-boats. My big hunter-killer groups and the mammoth escorts on "Malta convoys" kill them OK but they never seem to get less numerous. AI continues to work over my subs but I'm still killing the AKLs his merchant marine is reduced to. The Ching An Tui organization must have bottomless reserves of men. Chairman Mao kills 'em like flies but the units (though never strong) never seem to attrit down.

Taxcutter -> RE: I Have Returned (4/16/2021 9:52:25 PM)
Sitrep July 1, 1944 Invasions galore. Took Roi-Namur and Kwajalein simultaneously. Already have operational bases there. Roi is the air base and Kwaj is for support ships. Fleet is back in Pearl clearing up minor damage and refitting. Probably venture out for Wake middle of the month, and Eniwetok a little later. I'm gonna pull a fast one on AI when I hit Wake. His E class patrol boats are still kicking my subs' butts, so I'm gonna split off six CVs from the Wake operation and lay about 9 hexes outside the sea lanes south of Tokyo Bay. I'll leave a few subs there as bait and will hit the convoys with about a hundred carrier attack planes. See how tough his E-class boats are with thousand pounders raining down on them. I took Makassar and within three days I was pulverizing Soerabaja. It's down to 80% damaged airfield and 75% damaged port. AI left the CVE Chuyo in Soerabaja and now my airedales are claiming 13 hits on her. I've already hit their repair shipyard hard with the overspray off the port attack. After reducing the port by 100% (gets all the minesweepers) I'll mine it and start on the oil and refinery. In any case it is no threat even to lightly escorts TFs. China is going well. I have air bases at Canton, Hong Kong, Amoy, Foochow and Wenchow. Not enough bombers there yet to start bombing Kyushu just yet but I can bear down of Taipei.

Taxcutter -> RE: I Have Returned (5/1/2021 9:48:38 PM)
Sitrep Aug.1, 1944 Wake Island turned out to be a paper tiger. The First Marine Division exterminated them in a single day. Wake may have been a fueling base for subs operating off the US West Coast. I sank a couple of SS in the port. I'm getting the assault troops back to Hawaii and the garrison landed. Losses minimal. Ray Spruance took four big CVs to within ten hexes of Tokyo. Haven't gotten any AK or E action yet but the TF stood off five big kamikaze attacks on the 31st of the month. My Hellcats & flak shot down 219 planes with only four losses. The Hornet was hit by a kamikaze, but not badly enough to back off. Two CLs were hit but will easily make Bremerton. The kamikazes were well escorted but the Zeros may have well been kamikazes as well. The Hellcats killed them at an astonishingly high ratio. B-24s have been re-arranging the crushed coral on Truk. Once I take Ponape and Eniwetok I'll use B-25s to keep that place suppressed and move my B-24s to China and start bombing Kyushu. B-25s are fine for neutralizing bases but I think city destruction may be beyond them. I've had 100 B-25Cs working over Soerabaja for two months and they aren't enough. I'm building up the air base at Pare Pare and have laid on an invasion of Dempassar to host shorter-ranged planes. Chiang is slowly rooting all the IJA forces out of the region south of the Yangtse River. The AI has it in for Mao and keeps making futile attacks in the mountains SW of Beijing. It's a shame both sides can't lose there. No longer are my convoys to Hong Kong/Canton true "Malta Convoys." A few CVEs suffice. Chiang's corps are getting pretty muscular. Burma is quickly becoming like the South Pacific area. AI can't touch Rangoon and I've got supply in Rangoon to run the Burma Road until Ronald Reagan takes over the White House. However AI has it in for the RN surface forces. He has been running BB and CA TFs to attack my sub base at Port Blair. PoW will be in the Blighty yards for three months and Repulse (after I spent three months refitting her up to Renown flak status) got sunk. Renown is in the Aden yards and Queen Elizabeth is in the Columbo yards with some cruisers for a six week vacation. I have clogged the Malacca Strait with RN subs and lots of air search overhead. Apparently the RN stung them back. Until I can kill some escorts, I think I'm gonna pull all my subs (other than the defensive subs in the Malacca Strait) for a while. The losses aren't worth the measley AKLs I'm finding. B-29s are training at Seattle and Lahaina until I can get bases in the Marianas. I am moving the Tenth Air Force to Darwin to move into China later.

Taxcutter -> RE: I Have Returned (5/4/2021 12:53:34 AM)
Some excitement. Sitrep Aug. 3, 1944 Small excitement. No more pad thai in Chang Mai. The Indian army wiped out two RTA divisions and are now moving southward. Big excitement. I was using six CVs in three TFs under Halsey to cover the rat slug at Wake. At the same time Spruance took four CV in two TF to raid supply convoys coming into Tokyo Bay and maybe kill a few escorts. Spruance was standing about four hexes east of Chichi Jima. KB came out to play - - in force. Eight CV including four of the original Pearl Harbor raiders and hundred of plane of wildly varying quality. AI hit ol' Ray with about 250 kamikazes escorted by some rookie Zero drivers. The 170 Hellcats killed these like VX gas killing cockroaches. The The Hellcats killed all the zeroes and most of the kamikazes. One CV damaged but its deck was not fouled. Then the pros came in. Still lots on IJN planes flamed in but this time the Zeroes took a toll. Long story short, Spruance lost three CV and a lot of planes/pilots. The Hornet II ran for Pearl and Halsey went to flank speed to rescue them. My attack planes failed completely. Two bomb hits two different Kongos. Big deal! KB ran back to Tokyo Bay and thumbed their noses at my subs. I'm recovering Spruance' force. Fortunately I have two fresh CFV at Pearl and two more due in a month or so. I'm glad I had stripped Wasp II of their attack planes and put two Hellcat squadrons on her. They killed lots of Japanese planes but in the end sank and took 84 Hellcats and pilots down with them. I did shoot down at least 220 IJN planes, but I'll need to be a little more circumspect when I get that close to Japan.

RangerJoe -> RE: I Have Returned (5/4/2021 3:19:45 AM)
Mass, not driblets.

Taxcutter -> RE: I Have Returned (5/4/2021 4:30:38 PM)
Yeah, I know. Concentration of force. But with the distances involved the whole operation gets to be very slow-moving. It all moves at the speed of the slowest (or farthest) ship. More than anything, the poor performance of my attack planes was a big disappointment.

Taxcutter -> RE: I Have Returned (5/23/2021 8:12:08 PM)
Sitrep Sept 1, 1944 Slow but fairly steady progress. Wake has been taken and developed as a search/ASW base. I think AI had been using Wake as a sub refueling base. Same may be true of Eniwetok (next on the CenPac hit list). AI can still station subs off LA but they can't seem to stay very long. AI used a couple of CV sorties to derail my plans. The Unryu and some DDs (with a tanker) worked behind me between Pearl and SF. Sank a couple of merchants but his air wing was small. Took a while to find him - had to even divert 40-odd B-29s training at Lahaina, but I did find her and sank her and the DDs. The Tanker seems to have gotten away. Soon as my big CVs get back to Pearl they can cover a ROFL-stomp at Eniwetok. An army and a Marine Division are loading up. Ponape will get similar treatment. After taking Ponape, the road to the Marianas is open. I have a vast assault force prepped. Also a huge force of Seabees will be ready to make the Marianas B-29 central. A two CV force slowed down my Hong Kong express. Fortunately I left a big escort force to get supplies and troops to Shaoheng and Wenchow. I plan to use those two bases for strategic attacks on Kyushu while the B-29s on the Marianas tenderize Honshu. The Chinese have a mini-Stalingrad going at Changsha. I hold the base but he ran his entire 11th Army (eight infantry divisions plus some armor in. As usual AI ignored his flanks and I now have him isolated. I need to kill off this force and have most of my enhanced Chinese Corps committed. The Aussies took Balikpapan and now the Makassar Strait is now the Taxcutter Strait. In the process of developing. It will be a wonderful fueling base. Also I will use it as a base for the Dutch CLs to patrol the strait for singleton blockade runners. Australian Spitfires will discourage kamikazes. B-25Cs have pummelled Soerabaja. I just took Dempassar and am developing Pare Pare so I can use smaller US and Australian aircraft to suppress this base. Things are about played out in Burma. Once my six-division force (with mucho artillery) take Tavoy, I'm gonna transfer all the Tenth Air Force to the Darwin-Hong Kong sector. The British aircraft pools are shallow so really all I can do is let Spitfires slaughter kamikazes. Spits are murder on Oscars but so far I've had to keep some P-47D25s around to spank the Franks. I just dispatched 25 subs from Midway to infest the waters between Tokyo Bay (where Kido Butai is hiding and Chichi Jima). My subs have lost the qualitative edge so now I'll just channel my inner Stalin and use numbers.

Taxcutter -> RE: I Have Returned (6/6/2021 8:14:11 PM)
Sitrep Oct. 1, 1944 Slogging away. Distance has really become the enemy. Finally took Tavoy. It had some of he toughest fighting aircraft mechanics ever seen. Part of the problem was the British (being avid colonialists) spent resources hunting down live or wounded members of the 4th Nehru regiment and stringing them up, then feeding the carcasses to the salt water crocs. In the CenPac I took Eniwetok without much of a fight and it really wasn't worth much of a fight. At least my ultra-low-range USMC recon B-24s are getting a good look at the Marianas. I'll have to commit at least five divisions plus armor and artillery to the three biggest islands. Those rocks are crawling with troops. Makes sense. If I were the IJ player that's where I'd want to make a stand, particularly if Kido Butai is still around. I may take Yap and maybe Pagan as preliminaries to put fighter and search assets in the area plus Yap is in B-25 range of Saipan. Its a long pull from Pearl and the Marshalls are not much help. My AOs are gonna get a workout, I'm afraid. Got a real donnybrook going on at the Tokyo Bay outfall. 25 subs - all Balaos. IJN is really on its ASW game though. I have Halsey sneaking up with 12 big CVs and 8 fully upgraded CVEs (Eight CV TFs). I still need to kill off some of those "E" escorts. If Kido Butai wants to play then lets throw down. Kido Butai snuck out 2 CVs and raided Hong Kong. I had a lot of assets there but my fighters were very CAP heavy. As a result, both of us lost a lot of strike planes and came away with little to show for it. Burma is winding down. I've run AI out of most of Thighland, all of Cambodia and just Mergui holds out in Burma. My RAF bomber pools are totally exhausted. All I can do is pile up elite Spit VIII squadrons and let AI beat his head against that wall. Even RAF fighter aircraft and pilot pools are getting thin. I've run a British (not Indian) Division to Hong Kong to handle garrison duty and show His Majesty's flag where it started. I'm in the process of transferring all the US assets to the Hong Kong front. I have invasions TFs sailing to kick down the door to the Sulu Straits. After that, I have divisions planned to take Palawan so I can suppress kamikazes out of Manila and Clark. Recon not showing much garrison. After that: Formosa.

Taxcutter -> RE: I Have Returned (6/15/2021 8:53:52 PM)
Sitrep Oct.21, 1944 Trying to pick up the tempo. War came to Ponape and the garrison was found to be...wanting. After two days of the fury of the 2nd Marine Div, my REMFs are taking over. Ultra long range B-24 recon planes are scoping out Yap. I blitzed Jolo, Tawi Tawi, and the island east of Jolo. The 7th Australian is clearing out the Tarakan area. Balikpapan is providing fuel for my DEI and China operation. Soerabaja is being bombed mercilessly. It is tough to keep an equatorial city burning. It rains a lot there. However the port is flat and the oil and refinery burn merrily. Invasion TFs are en route to Palawan Island. Airedale recon shows thin garrisons but I'm taking no chances, with a heavily reinforced corps and lots of SeaBee regiments following on. AI has been slipping singleton tankers through the PI to Singapora/Palembag and Medang. Big bases and cruisers should put an end to that. KB is still there - at least shipwise. I've killed an awful lot of his strike planes. I currently have the Third Fleet camp just north of Marcus Island just within range of oldest (longest range) Zeros. AI has thrown clouds of kamikazes at this ten CV force but they get nowhere when face with a 300 Hellcat BARCAP. I'm currently using two-CV TFs so my co-ordination is satisfactory. At current rate my carrier fighter squadrons will be at least half aces and even the noobs will be "veteran" quality. This operation has been the Super Bowl of oiler operations. Further, I've had to run relief DDs from Pearl to make good mechanical breakdowns. I general I'm in fine logistical shape. All I have had to expend is 130 octane avgas and .50 BMG ammo. Tavoy fell and Mergui is under seige. I got a foothold at Bangkok. The general in charge of the IJA 3rd Army is gonna fight it out. All the RTA units are gone. The King of Siam bugged out in the last train to Singora. Now the ladies of his court are "comforting" IJA corporals and sergeants while the King tries to wheedle a few bowls of rice... The IJA Eleventh Army was exterminated at Changsha after an eleven-month campaign. That battle wore down Chiang's army. I'll probably have to let them recover for a month or two. Chiang's "grand battery" of 136 guns (none bigger than 82mm mortars) are bombarding Loyang. I think the second half of 1943 and all of 1944 have bled the Kwantung Army out. Resistance is soft, but as Kipling said: You just can't hustle the East. I'm building a major air base at Shaoshing (opposite Shanghai). Only its dinky little port is holding me back, but I have an engineer brigade which should make it the first base for the reduction of Kyushu. Already it is a place where kamikazes got to die. A full fighter group of P-47s feasts on poorly escorted losers. It has all versions of B-25s from there able to hit Kagoshima. Oddly, I really haven't sunk many big IJN ships. AI is enraged that I built a sub base at Port Stanley and keeps sortying BBs out. That's OK. It gives my old obsolete British scows something to do.

BBfanboy -> RE: I Have Returned (6/15/2021 10:19:24 PM)
Interesting developments! BTW - Port Stanley is in the Falkland Islands, E of South America. Would you have meant Port Blair or Port Moresby?

Taxcutter -> RE: I Have Returned (6/16/2021 4:24:42 PM)
Port Blair. Really too small and distant for the short-legged RN subs. It looks to me like an approach up the southern side of New Guinea is doable. You're not so dependent on neutralizing Truk and Darwin at least gives yo a level six port as a local base. Puerto Princesa and Tay Tay don't appear to be all that strongly garrisoned. I get those and develop an anti-kamikaze base there, then its time to transfer troops to Hong Kong for a Formosa campaign by the SWPAC forces. I'm in the process of transferring all the Tenth AQAF and US SE Asia troops to SWPAC command. Burma/Thighland are becoming a cul-de-sac.

Taxcutter -> RE: I Have Returned (6/19/2021 9:50:45 PM)
Sitrep Nov. 1, 1944 Looks like the preliminaries in the Central Pacific are about over. I hold Eniwetok, Ponape, the Marshalls, and the Gilberts. Truk is just a pile of crushed coral. I'm reconning the Marianas. Guam, Saipan, and Tinian are all well garrisoned (over 20,000 men) and no doubt dug in halfway to the center of the earth. Makes sense. Its the only place to have the decisive engagement if you are the Japanese. He has lots of planes there but that no longer impresses me. I just had Halsey with twelve CVs and six CVE camp off Tokyo Bay and kill kamikazes and more importantly any usable fighters AI has left. I took station just southeast of Toroshima Island and stood off his older Zeroes then moved in to mangle the rest of them. KB did not come out to play, but otherwise he threw the kitchen sink at my carriers. I had my BARCAP well co-ordinated and nothing kills IJN and IJAAF fighters like 300+ Hellcats. For some reason, AI does not like Georges. The only thing he uses them for is kamikazes. AI uses Franks as fighters. I'll hit Saipan with a five or six division assault - depending on shipping. The ground pounders are fully prepped. The air over Darwin, Brisbane, Pearl Harbor, and Lahaina are full of planes furiously training. P-51D replacements are beginning to show up. AI's night nuisance raids are encountering P-61s but the state of the art for night air warfare is still primitive. Much sound and fury - signifying nothing. Merchant ships are getting hard to find and no matter how many escorts my dive bombers sink, AI is playing a good ASW game, so I'll just shorten my orders phase work and pull all my subs in for a while.

Taxcutter -> RE: I Have Returned (6/20/2021 2:18:29 PM)
AS AI's empire is compressed he is finding a use for his short-legged RO-class submarines. As I expand based in coastal China and the DEI and expand air search, I now see his sneaky little convoys plying across the Phillipine Sea and through the PI. Dauntlesses are the answer. His oil ports are dwindling away. I occupy Balikpapan and am in the process of taking Tarakan. I have bombed Soerabaja to mush. Brunei/Miri are sitting ducks. I haven't started on bombing the Home Islands yet but you can bet the ports are high on the priority list. Tibbetts and the A-bomb squadron are training at Wendover. I may not need them. Chiang is on the doorstep of Shanghai. Usually AI surrenders when Shanghai falls. I now have F-7 (B-24 based) recon planes in China. I can start assessing what he has left in Korea and Manchuria.

Taxcutter -> RE: I Have Returned (7/6/2021 8:17:14 PM)
Sitrep Dec. 1, 1944 20th Army at Bangkok reported to Singapore that the outpost at Mergui did not make a morning report. Some radio operators report hearing transmissions from IJA units but they are not responsive. Telephone links had been severed weeks ago. What happened was that, after weeks of patient bombardment, the British/Indian army fired off a hurricane barrage and made an all-out shock attack. The IJA was evicted from their delapidated forts and lost the base. The infantry has halted to reorganize and mop up the remnants. About 200 heavy guns left the area at mid-day and began moving north around the mountains for the final showdown at Bangkok. Bangkok itself is surrounded and the British took Ayuthia, so Bangkok can be attacked without the river defensive penalty. Stockpiling supply. An IJN CV (non KB) raid by two three smaller CVs ran up into the bottom of the Makassar Strait and struck a tanker convoy bound for Balikpapan. They did sink two tankers but the fighters in this TF were not up to KB standards and two squadrons of RAAF mangled their fighter escort. This left a rather half-baked counterstrike from Dembassar with a chance. The raiding force withdrew with all three carriers burning and with greatly diminished air groups. I guess they are based in Singapore. My recon does not reach Singapore at this time. They are certainly not based at the soggy ash-heap I've made of Soerabaja. My invasion force crawls toward Saipan at the best speed of my LSTs. This force is four very heavily reinforced divisions covered by Halsey's Third Fleet. Recon shows a roughly 40,000 man garrison (no doubt dug in down to the water table) and about 300 land-based aircraft (mostly kamikazes I suspect) in the islands. Fragments of KB are moving southwest out of the Sea of Japan toward Tokyo to mass up for the "decisive battle." I flooded the zone between Tokyo and Saipan with about 60 subs. This may be the last hurrah for my sub force, as AI has REALLY upped his ASW game. Right now the equation is one merchant for one sub (50% sunk, the rest limping for Pearl). I've noticed AI does the same thing I do: Send out one or two merchants and escort them with a half dozen modern DEs. I have another 400,000 ton heavily escorted "Malta Convoy" passing Jolo en route to Hong Kong. Chiang has crushed the 11th Army at Changsha and then blitzed Wuhan Hankow and three outposts are surrounded. Most of Chiang's army has made good the losses of the bloodbath at Changsha and is marching to a river crossing to take out the Hankow pocket. Probes have found weakness at Nanking. Puppet infantry manning deep fortifications. Recon shows I have indeed worn down the China Expeditionary and Kwantung Armies. Mukden is not garrisoned at all. Chiang may be poised for an "Operation Bagration" dash across the Han homeland. I have taken and am developing Palawan as a prelude to invading Formosa. I am building up my aircrew pools. Offensive operations will go through good aircrew like crazy.

Taxcutter -> RE: I Have Returned (7/12/2021 10:38:53 PM)
Sitrep Dec. 16, 1944 As Hitler rolls his last dice I am tightening the noose on AI. One fly in the ointment. AI is kicking my subs' butts. I am pulling them out of Japanese waters. I'm getting one torpedo hit on a xAKL and he sinks a sub. Not worth it. The air assets in China are really starting to bite into his shipping and lots of sweeps are wearing down his fighters. P47s and P51Bs at Puerto Princessa are grinding down his fighters at Manila and Clark. Kamikaze are having to go out naked. My big fleet is camped eleven hexes from Saipan daring him to mount a kamikaze attack. Let him sample the firmness of my BARCAP. No sign of KB so far but I have scads of search assets out looking.

Taxcutter -> RE: I Have Returned (7/14/2021 12:02:15 AM)
Update Dec 17, 1944 AI gets greedy. I had some subs working the South China Sea. AI sent out a hunter-killer group to bag some of them (Hosho plus 2XDD and 4XE). He neglected the naval search and I also had a Malta Convoy" crossing to Hong Kong. Part of its escort was a SA TF (4x Standard BB plus 3 Brooklyn CL and some destroyers). AI never saw them coming and now his hunter-killer group is a bunch of oil slicks. Also the Marianas campaign begins with air base strikes at Pagan. Wrecked about a dozen and a half planes on the ground. No sign of KB. If he lets me kill off his land-based planes in detail that's OK by me. I'm trying to goad AI into a long-range kamikaze strike with only a few Zero escorts.

RangerJoe -> RE: I Have Returned (7/14/2021 3:49:39 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: Taxcutter Update Dec 17, 1944 AI gets greedy. I had some subs working the South China Sea. AI sent out a hunter-killer group to bag some of them (Hosho plus 2XDD and 4XE). He neglected the naval search and I also had a Malta Convoy" crossing to Hong Kong. Part of its escort was a SA TF (4x Standard BB plus 3 Brooklyn CL and some destroyers). AI never saw them coming and now his hunter-killer group is a bunch of oil slicks. Also the Marianas campaign begins with air base strikes at Pagan. Wrecked about a dozen and a half planes on the ground. No sign of KB. If he lets me kill off his land-based planes in detail that's OK by me. I'm trying to goad AI into a long-range kamikaze strike with only a few Zero escorts. [:-] The environmentalists are going to be mad at you. Your ships forgot to light that oil on fire to dispose of it.

Taxcutter -> RE: I Have Returned (7/16/2021 7:02:51 PM)
Sitrep: Mele Kalemaka 1944 Americans celebrate as the first 4E bomber mission over the Japanese home islands was carried out. Not a huge affair: 64 B-24J escorted by 24 P47D25 with 48 P38L sweeping ahead. A little damage to the airfield and destroyed some potential kamikazes. Saipan invasion force is still crawling at the speed of a LST toward the target. AI finally sent a float plane out to find where all those damned US attack planes wrecking the airbases at Saipan and Pagan are. So far no sighting of KB. My surveillance subs are all running low on fuel but I do have lots of naval search along like approach avenues and about half Halsey's dive bomber are on search missions as well. AI got aggressive with Nagato and Hyuga and that has resulted in a re-arrangement of everything above the weather deck. They have not been sunk but are a whole lot less fearsome than before. Pools are getting to be a problem. I'm having to back-grade my P47B25 squadrons as production has ceased. British and Australian attack plane production has pretty much ceased and all I can do is cherish the few attack planes they have left.

Taxcutter -> RE: I Have Returned (7/19/2021 4:19:35 PM)
Sitrep: Auld Lang Syne 1945 VICTORY! Japan surrenders. VJ-Day four months before VE-Day. Saipan invasion landing craft were being loaded. Japan starved out but not devastated. Only the HI at Sasebo was flattened. Bangkok, Saigon, and Singapore still holding out most because I slowed the Burma Front after securing Rangoon. PI largely undamaged after initial conquest. China liberated south of the Yangtze, but Shanghai was not (yet) taken. Jumping on the "Malta Convoy to Hong Kong" strategy worked. Four KB carrier survived, but all with some damage, no fuel, and very thin (but well-trained and experienced) air wings. Typical squadrons were five planes with elite aircrew. Yamato indeed was mauled in 1942 still with 35 FLT damage on VJ day. Musashi, Nagato, and Mutso sunk. Rest of both IJNAF and IJAAF aircrew were good only as kamikazes. Even that was thin. By my count there were less than 300 planes in the whole empire and most of them were trapped in Singers and Saigon. By my count, AI had left just shy of 850,000 troops abandoned in Malaya, Vietnam, PI, Java. Sumatra, New Guinea, the Marianas, Truk, and the Solomons. This AI is actually pretty good for old-school AI. Time to take a break. I need to figure out how to install some mods.

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