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Don Bowen -> Accumulated answers for TIMJOT (2/17/2005 9:52:23 PM)
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ORIGINAL: TIMJOT
Yes absolutely correct they didnt ship out as convoy but they did leave on the same day in should all be within 60miles (1hex). Personally I feel all units should be frozen with there Dec.7th designation and it should be up to the player to decide wether to return them to SF or not. No reason to believe that under all circumstances the 218th would have been sent east.
I think we'll limit it to just the 198th FA Bn. The exclusion of 218th, based on it's leaving the west coast, is probably better. A very large number of units were temporarily on the West Coast and then moved east - 3rd Infantry Division comes to mind along with several air groups.
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Regarding the 70th PS. According to the 70th FS History and USAAF in WWII Vol.1, the squadron was embarked on the SS Pres. Johnson. Neither say whether or not with their a/c. However Neorhorster indicates they were embarked with 18 P-36As and all sources indicate thats the aircraft the 70th was equiped with prior to embarking. The 70th FS history does say the first time they saw a P-39 was when they uncrated them in Fiji.
Personally dont feel that it is much a stretch that the a/c were embarked. It was common practice to ship crated a/c on APs early in the war. The APs SS Pres. Coolidge, SS Mariposa and USAT Etolin and USAT Miegs all ferried crated aircraft to Oz in the first weeks of the war. Certainly the P-36s would be in better shape than the decrepit P-35s in the PI. Regardless wether you decide to embark them or not the 70th PS should start the game equiped with P-36s that upgrade to P-39s.
This is an old argument - never resolved. Dr. Niehorster and I disagreed on the aircraft of the 70th when I sent him the information for the convoys and we still do. I believe the more detailed information at: http://newsletter.adf-serials.com/news0703.shtml. Also note that several army units and quite a bit of supply was piled up at San Francisco due to lack of available shipping - it just does not make sense that any of this limited resource would be used to ship obsolete aircraft that were expected to be replaced within a month or two.
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Off topic but, what have decided to do about the 34th RCT (not in the game oob) that was preparing to embark for the PI at SF on Dec 7th? Historically, Roosevelt had wanted to send this unit as planned to the Far East theater but was overruled by the Army which insisted it go to Hawaii where it eventually was absorbed into the 24th Division. FDR did get his way in insisting that the Pensecola convoy continue on to Oz angainst the Army's wishes. Again I think these decision she be left up to the player.
There are a number of units involved in this: 24th Infantry Division, 25th Infantry Division, 298th Infantry Regiment (Hawaii National Guard), 299th Infantry Regiment (Hawaii National Guard), 34th Infantry Regiment, and 161st Infantry Regiment (Washington National Guard):
Just before the war the old, square "Hawaiian" Division was split to form the 24th and 25th Infantry Divisions. Each of the new divisions was formed from a brigade of the "Hawaiian" division plus a regiment from the Hawaii National Guard (don't remember which to which and typing too fast to go look it up). The two Hawaii National Guard Regiments had large numbers of Americans of Japanese descent in their ranks. Both the 34th and 161st were to be sent to the Philippines - the 34th was in San Francisco (awaiting loading) and the 161st was about to arrive there.
Then the war began. After Pearl Harbor the loyalty of the Japanese-American Troops in the 298th and 299th was questioned. These two regiments were detached from the 24th and 25th Infantry Divisions and were replaced by the 34th and 161st. The Japanese-American personnel were removed from the 298th and 299th and sent to the US for eventual (excellent) service in Italy. The 298th and 299th were then collapsed into one regiment (298th), which remained independent - the 299th was officially disbanded.
This is a total of 8 regiments that were part of the 24th and 25th Infantry - seven of which persisted. The base Scenario 15 comes with eight - the full strength 24th and 25th Divisions (total of 6 regiments, identity not specified), plus the 161st and the 298th. This leaves out the 34th but already overstates the actual OOB by not considering the disbanding of the 299th. It would actually be more correct to remove the 161st than to add the 34th.
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Any decision on the 27th Lt BG. I realize its original pilots and ground crews were in the PI, but its A24s and 48 replacement pilots plus ground crews were embarked on the Pencecola convoy. This unit was reformed upon arrival to OZ with these replacements and a cadre that was flown out from the PI. Since this unit did become operational, its my feeling it should be included but with very low expirience and moral to model the adhoc nature of the unit.
Historically, some personnel from the 27th Bomb Group were withdrawn to Australia where they formed two Provisional Light Bomb Squadrons using the A-24s from the Pensacola Convoy - the 16th and 91st Bomb Squadrons. At least one of these units (91st) fought in Java and perhaps the other (it got at least to Darwin). The remaining A-24s were used to temporarily equip the 8th Bomb Squadron of the 3rd Bomb Group when it arrived in Australia in early 1942.
The original Scenario 15 has the 8th Squadron equipped with A-24s and arriving at San Diego in February, 1942. The two other squadrons also arrive individually with (A-20 and B-25) and therefore the 3rd Bomb Group is not in the scenario. I think this is an excellent representation of the 3rd Group.
We have also created the 16th and 91st Bomb Squadrons, equipped with A-24 and set to appear at Brisbane on December 22, 1941 (the date the Pensacola Convoy arrived there). This presents an accuate representation of the early war A-24 units but there is no way to force disbandment of the two provisional squadrons so the OOB is somewhat overstated.
Don
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