Expanding Empire
2
2100 June 16th 1945.
BB Division 1 Flagship. IJN Yamashiro, Gulf of Mannar.
A French Submarine fleet had been spotted weeks ago as it began to enter the patrolled sea zones. It had finally reached the North Mariana Trench having been largely ignored until this point.
In a ground breaking engagement an enemy vessel was sunk by one of Japan's Submarines. The festivities would continue for several days as a result of the actions of 17 Sensuikantai.
0000 June 19th 1945.
Industry Offices. Tokyo, Japan.
Another of the production runs that had been providing materials for the Japanese Armed Forces completed which would allow Ginjiro to re-distribute industry again.
The final two Tactical bomber squadrons were completed, and after their intial deployment, they headed for northern China to organise themselves.
0000 June 19th 1945.
Diplomatic Offices. Tokyo, Japan.
"Tea?" Mamoru asked the Ambassador as he was shown into his office.
"As long as it is of the same quality as it was on my last visit." replied the Soviet Ambassador.
"It is."
"Excellent. I take it this is not purely a social visit Minister Mamoru."
"A small business matter has cropped up but I am sure we can quickly get that out of the way."
"Japan still has more than enough supplies to provide your every expanding Armed Forces with more. We merely require some energy in exchange." Mamoru proposed.
"That seems reasonable. I think we can agree on the terms and I really would like some of that tea before it gets cold." the Ambassador replied.
"Of course Ambassador." Mamoru replied as he switched topics to something completely unrelated to war or diplomacy.
0400 June 20th 1945.
BB Division 1 Flagship. IJN Yamashiro, In Transit.
Yamamoto was moving his fleet in response to the requirements of Operation Trust but was still receiving all necessary reports. An enemy Transport fleet had foolishly entered the Palau Trench and BB Division 3 had sailed to intercept and sink the fleet.
On this occasion the Japanese interceptors had not picked up all of the enemy vessels in the area and Namoru had a fight on his hands.
The actual fleet that BB Division 3 encountered contained three Transport Divisions as well as one Destroyer Division and the Battleship USS New York. It was likely that they were intending to try and invade Palau with this force but Yamamoto would never know if that was the case as the two fleets closed and the shells began to hit their targets.
IJN Yamato would account for the Destroyer Division and one of the Transport Divisions while the Heavy Cruiser IJN Atago would sink a second Transport Division. This left the Battleship IJN Musashi to exchange fire with USS New York. The bigger guns of the Japanese ship would tell as the USS New York followed many other ships to the bottom of the Palau Trench.
The news was very welcome to Yamamoto who had been keeping a very close eye on enemy fleets and their compositions. He knew that the USS New York had been the flagship of Admiral Reeves and had split from that fleet for this battle. This meant that Admiral Reeves had returned from his trip to Japan and the sealanes were therefore safe to travel.
Aircraft sank the final Transport Division before it could leave the Palau Trench and it was left to Japanese ships to pick up the American survivors. Amongst the floating debris several documents were discovered that had not been able to be destroyed quickly enough. These documents would make their way back to Japan for decoding and translation. The process would take several weeks to accomplish.
Mikawa set sail for Sapporo to return the infantry division to the province. He would then embark the headquarters division and transport it to northern China before beginning to ferry troops from Fukuoka to North Korea.
0200 June 21st 1945.
North China Army Headquarters. Lanzhou, China.
After a long journey by rail Higashikuni had arrived at his destination in northern China. His headquarters would be based in Lanzhou province until further notice where it would guard the airbase from partisans amongst other things.
The final two enemy divisions currently in northern India were attacked by General Abe from Ahmadabad with support from the Tactical bombers using its airbase. Victory was swift as the defenders had already been softened up by the bombers. No advance would follow for the time being as the province was too vital to risk it falling back into enemy hands. The bombers would do the rest of the work for Higashikuni.
0000 June 23rd 1945.
Industry Offices. Tokyo, Japan.
The completion of various production projects had allowed Ginjiro to transfer industrial output towards repairing Japan's damaged forces.
The repair work had been going well and some surplus was now available to begin the long process of upgrading the Japanese Armed Forces. The amount would increase as repairs were completed which should provide a steady increase in modernisation of the Armed Forces.
Some units were of higher priority than others and he already knew which would be delayed. All interceptor squadrons were listed as not to be upgraded as further research would make such upgrades obsolete in the near future. All headquarters divisions not in Asia were also added to the list of units not to be immediately available for upgrade. Priority was given to upgrading the older Tactical bombers to a slightly better variant.
0500 June 24th 1945.
The Skies Above the North Mariana trench.
A small respite had been seen due to the capture of Yap island but there were other enemy airbases in range of the Mariana islands.
One Strategic bomber wing had taken off to bomb the islands but it would not reach its destination as Mj. General Fukui led two interceptor wings to prevent it doing so. The damage was very one sided as the bombers were outnumbered two to one, but some minor damage was received by the interceptors.
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