Chapter 6: September Sucks
September 1st - 2nd
Continuing the monthly overview of how well this conflict is going for Japan, you'll see that we're wrecking them with over 61k tons of cargo sank worth nearly 400 IC. I'm uncertain why there's no naval ship losses reported for China, aside from convoys because I recorded multiple ships hitting the bottom. Ah well, moving on to the Air campaign, they've recently started bombing Japan and causing IC loss but it's a drop in the bucket compared to what they've lost. Due to my air units costing more than China's, our IC losses in air units has been heavier. In fact, most bomber units are sitting in air ports regaining Org and Strength. Lastly, where it truly counts in the land combat, they've lost over ten times in IC value and almost a hundred times in manpower. That...will get closer as I've got some battles coming up that don't go my way. But still, first month of the war and only losing 72 manpower to their over 5000 is nothing to sneeze at.
As discussed last chapter, here are the Lvliang and Yulin results. The Chinese really want their land back as they keep attacking me in Lvliang. At the end of August during the night time hours, a Chinese light cruiser was pounced upon by my main carrier fleet, the Kaga and Akagi with escorts.
The result was not in doubt as for not the first nor last time did carrier air groups sink the enemy ship.
September 1st dawned with several events which I'll go in to detail here.
Again, I neglected to capture the individual decisions but going left to right, I did not enforce food rationing which lowered our dissent by 1. Ensuring troops were to be fed would provide 10,000 supplies but at the cost of 2 dissent. As you can see on the top resource bar I'm sitting nicely with Supplies, so no need for this now. Here we also see the End of the 1911 US Agreement was accepted (third event from the left), gaining us 1000 Fuel - this is a result of Japan being at war with China and usually occurs in July. As you remember, I had to push the Marco Polo Bridge Incident back a month.
Scrap Metal Drive was, like the Food Rationing, not pursued this time and again our dissent drops by 1. If selected, 10k Metal would be added to our reserves at the cost of 2 dissent - at this time my Metal reserves are sufficient and in worse case I can simply trade for what I need.
Regardless of war time or not, on Sept 2 1937 there's a typhoon that hits Hong Kong and affects various areas around it. This has minimal impact to Japan (Taiwan indication not with standing) and we won't worry about it here. Later on, I believe there's a seperate river flooding event in northern China but due to our late attack, this too won't affect us. The last item on the right in this picture is how Japan can get more historical troops - we've indicated at the start of the game we wanted to go this route and this event is one of several generated by BICE to provide the units. I sadly cut off the very bottom (*sigh*) but you see how much manpower and supplies are spent to bring in 5 divisions, built out of the shells of 3 other divisions. Let me say, during normal wartime (July China Conflict) this can impede some of Japan's attacks as the 1st, 8th, and 9th are front line troops. It is still impactful here even with a month later, but not quite so fearful.
Shanghai makes the news as we will be getting forces set up in the enemy city momentarily. Read the second paragraph and note that bit about Japan making amphibious landings at a couple locations. This will be seen in the game as well, handled manually by yours truly!
Lastly, I've selected A War Bonds as it provides the most National Unity (B and C War Bonds are .02 and .01 respectively) at the least amount of dissent (B and C are more apiece). Not indicated in the flavor text but somewhat indicated in the middle wording, A Bonds give a little money each month or so while C would give a lot more. If money was a real issue, choosing the option of raising taxes would be ideal but at a huge hit to our dissent. Right now, money isn't an issue.
Some Chinese fighters dare to show their faces in the skies of Cangzhou, where we are currently attacking at a 96% rating. Perhaps they were hoping to sweep my bombers away but instead, it is my fighter group doing the sweeping! The Chinese Conflict is a great opportunity to get experience for our military prior to Dec 7 '41 and I will take every chance provided.
Here, we see the results of the Shanghai event yesterday with a strong Militia unit and standard SNLF Marine in the city trying to wrest it away from the Chinese. They will need some help though and here it comes!
All 5 of my fully built and ready SNLF Marines along with their HQs are being shuttled down toward the area to help out. I have some invasion zones pre-selected but not indicated here - you'll see the landings soon enough.
The presence of my troops in Shanghai has forced out 3 Torpedo Boats and a Transport liner of the Chinese and in to the waiting arms of one of my destroyer groups. Their loss!
Somehow the liner escapes but all 3 TBs and a wandering MTB gets to join their brethren at the bottom of the sea.
September 3rd Events
Here we see a bevy of more events on the 3rd which I'll get in to more detail with. Below the event list you can see the initial attack on Shanghai isn't going quite well for the Japanese at 16% currently but have no fear, the Marines are coming. Also, the Wangpan Yang battle (bottom left corner) is going heavily against the Chinese - my light carriers the Ryujo and Hosho have joined in the fun. After this conflict, I'll go thru my carriers and note Sunk Ships by each - already, it's an impressive tally! Looking back at the new events/decisions here, I do select the "Create them!" option for the middle decision on Convoy Raiders. This will later on generate a dozen or more converted freighters in to raiders, similar to the German's efforts in the Atlantic. In fact...we may see such a ship in the Indian Ocean or Pacific later on - the Germans get around!
Here, like before, we don't make our citizen's lives any harder and they love us for it as we don't conserve Energy. At this point dissent was at 4.3 due to previous events but this choice knocks it down to 3.3. Next, a Veteran Unit is created from our previous month of battles. You do lose a little money and supplies but as you see in the second screenshot, the chance of getting an elite unit is great. We only get a Veteran though - these are regiments that can be added to a division in the place of the normal HQ addition and provide much better bonuses as well with a snippet of what they provide below. A 10% bonus to attack and defense in all terrain is a lovely thing!
As Japan I typically see 5-8 of these appear during the Chinese Conflict and with Germany I can see a dozen or more thru the first two years of the war.
Forming the Northern China Area Army will create a couple units and HQs here, among them my first Army HQ. The cost is relatively minimal, though taking a 500 officer hit is pretty harsh to my ratio (currently at 104%). Lastly,
we get some defectors from the Chinese in areas we've overrun. This is a low-strength militia unit that I simply place on Beiping to hold. We also saw an increase in our shipyards, thanks to our focus on the Navy this year.
We gained one each of Small and Medium shipyards which will help us in the later years as we build up our Naval might. There was also a Rail Terminal (the first one) built that is providing some extra supply throughput - all these new buildings are described and explained in the BICE in-game help event you can trigger from the Diplomacy menu. Oh, and note the losses we're suffering now that the US cancelled their agreement from 1911 with us. Our resources are no longer seeing those gains of 25-65%, though we see some of our supplies and money improve. Ah, and let me not forget to point out our CAS units are going to be improved shortly - so long as I can upgrade them to level 2.
Speaking of research, Japan's Grand Battle Plan Doctrine is getting all the improvements I can at this point in time. Research is mixed with our Army currently seeing most of the benefits, but that will be changing soon as my Navy needs to catch up to 1937 tech and start getting better.
September 4th- 5th Events
We have even more events happening in a short span, with more RPs provided to my Carrier projects. This isn't all the CV projects available but it is a good number of them.
I accept formation of two more armies which provides a new Light Infantry unit and Corps HQ in Manchuria. They immediately get sent down south to join the fight in China there. After all the air battles my fighters have been involved in, apparently their morale will be improving soon! At least, that's how I roleplay it.
Note too the last item in this screencap about the IC investment. All those "free" units I've gotten so far aren't free - I mean, it did cost manpower, supplies, and other resources but building units also costs IC. Well, here is how BICE handles that IC cost by imposing a 20% IC reduction for a period of time to pay for them. Remember the picture of the Utility window I showed at the very start of this AAR? There is where you can adjust how much of an IC hit you take (20% or more), so you can pay off the investment quicker. More of a hit, quicker the payment is met and the sooner you can go back to your normal Production window. For Japan though, I stick with 20% for now as I need my IC intact as much as possible.
Here we see the option to remove the 3rd and 11th Divisions (Lucky and Brocade) and get them shipped for "free" to Shanghai. It does cost some manpower and resources to accomplish this, but I need them to help out the beachead there. Lastly, remember choosing to see revolts at the start of the game? Here's part of that payoff in the second screenshot with some Communist Chinese popping up on the map. Until I take that country, they'll be pushing a few militia units out in places I hold. Annoying!
Still at 16% but now with some reinforcements appearing. The afore-mentioned Lucky and Brocade Infantry Divisions along with a low-strength light armor unit and a Corps HQ to handle them all. Don't worry, these units will improve our odds dramatically here.
Now we're up to 50%! That garrison has no chance. What also has no chance were the Chinese in Cangzhou with over 4500 of them losing their lives to a mere 350 Japanese lost. Looking swiftly to the Western Front,
we are continuing the push westward with no losses to our side here.
Uh, what is this on the horizon? A lone Chinese Destroyer trying to interfere with my Marine landings? Fortunately, I left my light carrier group of Ryujo and Hosho here to provide defense - something I recommend for naval invasions.
Another Chinese fleet kisses the seafloor! Throughout the first half of the month most of the naval activity was seen by our surface ships but our underwater fleet wasn't idle - three transports were sunk in these 14 days of September.
September 6th- 7th Events
Another Veteran unit is generated and placed in Tokyo for later use for a unit to be build later. Australia also joins the embargo train but literally nothing happens to Japan for it - perhaps they would cancel any trades we had? Possibly this affects Australia in some way, too, but otherwise no notable effect occurs.
The extra units help out and we wrest Shanghai from Chinese control with minimal losses on our side. Note too that we've got some landings going on in the indicated provinces and one of our other landed SNLF units is working to secure the port north-west of Shanghai. We'll be landing with our Marines and eventually another couple more Infantry Divisions will join up to help expand out holdings in the new Shanghai Sector.
Another resource decision where we decline and improve dissent again by 1. Honestly, I almost never take these unless my resources are truly hurting. You can trade for what you're short in easy enough as it is, but I am glad these options are available just in case.
Looking over our Air Doctrines, we've got some work to do here as most everything is desired and needed. It'll come along though, no worries there!
In the middle portion of our front, we're moving in to Suide, setting us up by knocking on the Communist Chinese door to their capital. There's a small push on Yulin adjacent to Suide but this should be fought off handily.
Also taken care of handily as we end this chapter and the first week of September, a Chinese bomber gets jumped by one of my fighter groups.
It gets away but not without some damage first!
With that, the first week of September is completed - quite a lot happened which is why it gets it's own chapter. Next chapter will consist of the next week in September and we'll see how well we perform in this conflict.