Mike Solli
Posts: 15792
Joined: 10/18/2000 From: the flight deck of the Zuikaku Status: offline
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Thanks to everyone for my warm welcome back. Now, down to business. I'm going to review the map by sector. This one will be pretty long. It's one of the hot spots. 5 Fleet I put a lot (for the Japanese) of resources into building up Adak to try to keep Ted from taking the northern route to Japan. Here are some highlights of what has transpired: 23 Mar: I achieved my defensive goal: 7 BF (with DP guns), mines, Oscars, level 6 forts. A chutai of Judys is a few days out on a ship. 24k supply. Lots of Allied TFs around Dutch Harbor. I’m waiting for an invasion attempt. MKB2: Shoho, Zuiho and Hosho (54 VF, 24 VT) enroute but not there yet. 24 Mar: Allied TF with 7 BBs south of Dutch Harbor headed west. 28 Mar: Learn the Allied bombardment TF is 10 BB, CA, 4 CLAA & 9 DD. Adak’s damage is 23-75-97. I have lots of engineers there fortunately. 29 Mar: Bombardment Death Star (BDS) plasters Amchitka. Two trashed bases now. MKB2 still out of range. 31 March: BDS disappeared, probably to replenish. 2 Apr: MKB2 is stationed 6 hexes SW of Adak. 5 Apr: Adak damage fully repaired. Amchitka receives supply & more engineers. Big mistake on Ted’s part. I think several smaller bombardment TFs would have done better hitting Adak every day or two. 11 Apr: 2x 4 DD surface groups arrive to add to the defense. 24 Apr: 8 BB & 3 DD bombard Adak. Then 60 Dauntlesses(!) hit Amchitka. I had no idea US carriers were there. MKB2 was west & had been given order to move east, right into the US CVs. Several piecemeal attacks: -10 Kates, 20 Zeros vs. 29 Wildcats – 3K, 5Z, 3W lost, no damage. -18 Avengers vs. 31 Zeros – Avengers all shot down, no damage. -14K, 17Z vs. 39W – 11K, 10Z, 2W lost, no damage. -18A, 11W vs 26Z – 6A, 3W lost, no damage. Sheesh! 25 Apr: Both CV fleets around but out of range. BDS disappeared. 26 Apr: 2 US CVs and 3 Jp CVLs still hanging around looking at each other. 27 Apr: Ted starts sending AMs in to remove the mines. DP guns are getting most but about half the mines are swept. The Judy chutai plants a 500kg egg into Lexington. Turned out to be light-moderate damage. The invasion goes in: 41 Division and 151 Combat engineer regiment. 28 Apr: A 4 DD Fubuki division meets another invasion fleet and drives them off but only light damage caused (just a couple of shell hits). The 41 Div did a deliberate assault (figuring they’d have reinforcements). I lost basically nothing and they had a lot of disabled squads and some killed. 29 Apr: A BB from the BDS eats 3 sub torps. 30 Apr: the BDS (now 7 BB & 3 DD) hits Adak again. A Japanese MTB puts a torp into one of the BBs. Not much damage to Adak. 1 May: The two CV TFs blundered into each other again. This time there were 3 attacks causing 16 Japanese and 20 Allied planes to go down. No ship damage. 2 May: Both CV TFs and the BDS sail away from each other. Adak is repairing damage. 5 May: I've decided to "sort of" go all out to destroy the 41 Division. I know I really need lots of support to do it right though. Here's what I'm sending: KB2 - Junyo and Hiyo (54 Zeros, 36 Vals, 18 Kates). Surface fleet - Yamato, Musashi, Nagato, Mutsu MKB2 - Zuiho, Shoho and Hosho (54 Zeros, 24 Kates). They are headed for the Home Islands for replenishment. Slow Replenishment fleet 19 Division 71 Division 4x 15cm Howitzer Regiments 1x 90mm Mortar Regiment 6 May: More Allied AMs die (from the DP guns) sweeping all but 21 mines. I see the us CV TF hanging out near Dutch Harbor. A couple of cargo ships sacrificed themselves to drop some supply for the 41 Div. 7 May: 41 Div attacks again, and fails again. They did drop the fort level to 5. Drat! 8 May: The US CVs (Lex and Hornet) attacked Adak losing 9 of their number to Oscars! 9 May: 3 US BBs bombard Adak. What happened to the other 3? They caused little damage. 10 May: Another Allied invasion fleet dropped off the 58 &153 Separate Infantry Regiments at Adak. *Sigh* 12 May: Mines now up to 88. 14 May: I forgot to mention a sentai of Sallys arrived a week or so ago and are bombing the US troops, along with daily bombardment of them. Trying to keep their disruption high and burn their supply. Japanese supply hovers around 13-15k. 15 May: Yamato, Musashi, Nagato & Mutsu, along with 2 CL & 6 DD bomb the heck out of the Americans. Along with the Sally bombing and ground bombardment, the 41 Div AV dropped from 263 to 167. Nice.
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