1000 July 17th 1944.
BB Division 1 Flagship. IJN Yamashiro, North Molucca Sea.
The Transport fleet had arrived in Helmahera and safely embarked two more Japanese divisions. No hostile ships had been encountered during the journey and it was becoming clear that the majority of the American fleet was in port.
Nomura laid in a new course, this time towards Makassar, where he would temporarily deposit all four divisions currently on his ships.
Ozawa had split his four squadrons in to two seperate formations, with the damaged squadrons remaining in Saipan to undergo repairs. He led his own two squadrons east of the Mariana's in search of enemy shipping.
He found one unescorted Transport Division in the South Magellan Seamounts and several hours later found a second Transport fleet, this time with two Transport Divisions, closer to Saipan in the North East Mariana Basin.
All of these ships were heading west and the first entered the North Mariana Trench at 1600 hours July 18th. Rear Admiral Suekuni's 6. Kaigun was waiting for them.
The Submarines were unable to close with the Transport ships and so it was left to Ozawa to lead the force that would destroy both Divisions.
At 1600 hours on the 19th the Transport fleet that Ozawa had initially sighted also arrived off Saipan and was intercepted by Suekuni. Again he would fail to close but did succeed in forcing the Transports away from whatever their target had been. Ozawa would sink this fleet also once daylight arrived.
Yamamoto was slightly perplexed as to what these Transports were trying to achieve. They had not attempted to land troops on Saipan, and they would have failed if they had tried. The only conclusion that he could come up with was that they were trying to capture the undefended island of Tinian south of Saipan.
The Submarines could stop any such action unless the Transports came with escorts. The American's were clearly still intent on the area around Saipan and Yamamoto decided to take some steps to make sure that they did not gain a foothold.
The Transport fleet had disembarked four divisions in Makassar and headed south to Flores, where it would pick up the two divisions currently defending little of any consequence in Timor.
Yamamoto would take his own fleet north to Saipan to carry out repairs to his damaged vessels and provide a force that could stop most hostile actions in that region.
0000 July 20th 1944.
Diplomatic Offices. Tokyo, Japan.
Japan's Foreign Minister had little to do for the last few days other than try to find additional energy resources for his Country. He was having little success and welcomed the diversion of a message from the Communist Chinese Ambassador.
The diversion was short and the response to the Chinese was even shorter. A simple one word answer would suffice. 'No.'
0100 July 20th 1944.
North China Army Headquarters. Hengyang, China.
Higashikuni had moved south towards Wuzhou and had arrived in Hengyang which was adjacent to Wuzhou province.
His further advance into Wuzhou was halted by the arrival of two enemy divisions in the province. He was not concerned, in a matter of days these two divisions would be isolated when his armour closed the encirclement on them when it entered Liuzhou. They would become prisoners of war shortly there after.
1400 July 20th 1944.
BB Division 1 Flagship. IJN Yamashiro, East Celebes Sea.
Yamamoto was making good progress north when Nomura arrived in Flores to embark two more divisions.
Nomura headed for Soerabaja shortly after the last soldier was on board his transport ships. BB Division 2 was still in the area to provide protection if required but it looked unlikely that it would be needed.
After what seemed like an eternity American forces had finally managed to make an advance in New Guinea. They had captured Aitape.
0600 July 22nd 1944.
North China Army Headquarters. Hengyang, China.
Lt. General Hoshinato had arrived in Liuzhou which meant that two more Chinese divisions were now isolated.
Higashikuni would leave them until the next day as dusk was only a few hours away.
0900 July 22nd 1944.
BB Division 1 Flagship. IJN Yamashiro, Palau Trench.
Admiral Nomura had one final trip to make around the islands of Indonesia.
He headed back towards Makassar where he would embark two divisions and move them to Bandjermasin in Borneo. Once he had completed this task he would move to Sorong in New Guinea where he would wait until sufficient enemy forces had arrived to threaten Japanese troops on the island. He would then extract these troops and move them to a safer location.