Panther Bait
Posts: 654
Joined: 8/30/2006 Status: offline
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I think the strategy of trying to force a carrier battle is a unlikely to bear fruit, particularly in NoPac. As Canoerebel points out, Alaska is largely irrelevant at this stage of this particular game. Prince Rupert as a means to draw Allied attention in more valuable, but not his carriers. There are enough bases around that I think the more likely response would be to use restricted US air units and/or (maybe) dismounted carrier squadrons. Personally I would think he'd use the carriers (and their planes) anywhere except Canada/US West Coast. As the Allies, I might be tempted to try and raid the supply lines between the West Coast op area and Pearl Harbor or the Home Island, but probably not with anything other than massed sub attacks. An attack on Perth is more likely to require the presence of the combined Allied carriers to successfully repulse, but the question is would he try? I don't think it's really critical to keep the Japanese out of Perth, and I don't think the Allies overcommit on this vector. Ultimately, the Allies don't need to own any particular piece of the map in 1942 and you can't really force them to fight, at least not on the Japanese side of the various "lines of death." To me, if John was able to successfully take Perth and NoPac, the best course for the Allies would be to park the fleet in US East Coast or Karachi/Bombay/Cape Town. Rather than slog through the long routes of advance all the way across the map, consider a massed attack on Sumatra, Java, and/or Timor in late 1943 preceded by some distraction-type attacks with moderate CV presence on the extents of Japan's conquests to draw off the KB at the opportune time (probably in NoPac or Tahiti/Line Islands).
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When you shoot at a destroyer and miss, it's like hit'in a wildcat in the ass with a banjo. Nathan Dogan, USS Gurnard
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