Small Ship, Big War - The Voyages of the Hibiki

Post descriptions of your brilliant successes and unfortunate demises.

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Marc gto
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RE: Small Ship, Big War

Post by Marc gto »

Bravo!!
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Onime No Kyo
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RE: Small Ship, Big War

Post by Onime No Kyo »

CF,

I just spent a few hours reading the entries posted since I was last here. You are an absolute master. [&o]

I hope you still have in mind to compile this story in a book format.

[&o][&o][&o][&o]
"Mighty is the Thread! Great are its works and insane are its inhabitants!" -Brother Mynok
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kaleun
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RE: Small Ship, Big War

Post by kaleun »

Second that!
Appear at places to which he must hasten; move swiftly where he does not expect you.
Sun Tzu
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stuman
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RE: Small Ship, Big War

Post by stuman »

ORIGINAL: Onime No Kyo

CF,

I just spent a few hours reading the entries posted since I was last here. You are an absolute master. [&o]

I hope you still have in mind to compile this story in a book format.

[&o][&o][&o][&o]

Hear ! Hear !
" Gentlemen, you can't fight in here! This is the War Room. " President Muffley

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tocaff
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RE: Small Ship, Big War

Post by tocaff »

I enjoyed the levity of the "forum" entries and the thoughts that you planted.
Todd

I never thought that doing an AAR would be so time consuming and difficult.
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Cuttlefish
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RE: Small Ship, Big War

Post by Cuttlefish »

June 7, 1945

Location: 120 miles northeast of Matsue
Course: East
Attached to: TF 21
Mission: Surface combat
System Damage: 5
Float Damage: 0
Fires: 0
Fuel: 410

Orders: Unknown

---

Oizuma is cleaning Benzaiten’s cage when he feels the destroyer come about in a reasonably brisk turn. As a fast-moving and somewhat top-heavy destroyer will, Hibiki heels away from the turn, not into it. The turn goes on as Oizuma finishes cleaning the cage and changing the water and by the time the destroyer comes back onto an even keel he figures the ship has come about one hundred and eighty degrees.

Shortly afterward Riku and Yoshitake come trooping in. Oizuma looks an inquiry at them as they peel off their jackets and remove their shoes.

“The task force has been ordered to reverse course,” says Riku. “I don’t know why.”

“The word from the bridge is that they don’t know why either,” says Yoshitake.

“Do we know they don’t know?” asks Oizuma. “Or do we just think they don’t know?”

“We know that they don’t think they know,” says Riku.

“Ah,” says Oizuma. “That’s good to know.” Yoshitake looks from one man to another in confusion. Riku grins at him.

“Don’t worry about it, Yoshitake,” he says. “All it means is that we know what we usually know, which is nothing.”

“But this time we’re sure we know nothing,” puts in Oizuma. “Usually we think we know something, but we’re wrong.”

“Oh,” says Yoshitake, nodding. “Yes, I see. I have that trouble a lot. Usually what I think I know turns out to be wrong.”

“This way,” says Riku cheerfully, “you can’t be wrong.”

“I like that,” says Yoshitake. “Maybe I should try to know less, that way I will be wrong less often.”

“Ignorance is strength,” says Oizuma.

“Catchy phrase,” says Riku.

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tocaff
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RE: Small Ship, Big War

Post by tocaff »

I thought that ignorance was bliss.
Todd

I never thought that doing an AAR would be so time consuming and difficult.
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Canoerebel
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RE: Small Ship, Big War

Post by Canoerebel »

Who's on first?

P.S. Cuttlefish, I went back to the "forum" you created and enjoyed reading it thanks to helpful pointers from you and a few others. It wasn't the post, but rather the addled mind of the reader, that had caused the confusion. Well done!
"Rats set fire to Mr. Cooper’s store in Fort Valley. No damage done." Columbus (Ga) Enquirer-Sun, October 2, 1880.
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RE: Small Ship, Big War

Post by SireChaos »

ORIGINAL: tocaff

I thought that ignorance was bliss.

That was 1984. This is 1945.
Cuttlefish
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Assault on mainland Japan: Operation Longbow

Post by Cuttlefish »

June 8, 1945

Location: 100 miles northwest of Hakodate
Course: Northeast
Attached to: TF 21
Mission: Surface combat
System Damage: 5
Float Damage: 0
Fires: 0
Fuel: 375

Orders: Proceed to Wakkanai

---

War has a way of taking obscure places and elevating their names so that they echo in the pages of history. How many people would know anything at all about Gettysburg, even that it exists, had not Lee and Meade’s armies met there largely by chance? What would even students of history know about places like the Sajo river, the town of Waterloo, or the Gallipoli peninsula if armies had not met there?

These places become part of history, and sometimes part of legend. Their names are associated with glory, with tragedy, with victory, and with defeat. One thing can be said of almost all of them, however; you don’t want to be living in such a place when it is lifted from obscurity to fame. You really don’t.

---

Yamaguchi Prefecture is the southernmost prefecture in Honshu, a rugged peninsula bordered by the Sea of Japan, the Kanmon Strait, and the Inland Sea. It is not densely populated by Japanese standards, with few large towns and major roads. The capital is the city of Yamaguchi, near the center of the peninsula. The Japanese have few bases here; there are some naval and air facilities at Shimoneseki, at the very tip of the peninsula, and a modest naval base at Fukawa Bay on the Sea of Japan.

Fukawa Bay is warded by rugged and scenic Omijima Island. The bay itself is home to several small towns and fishing villages; in 1954 several of these will merge to form the small city of Nagato but as of 1945 they are still separate entities.

Allied planners had noted some time ago that there was almost no Japanese military presence on the peninsula. If an invasion force could pass the Korea Strait it could land there virtually unopposed. While the terrain at Yamaguchi is unfavorable for large-scale military operation the fact that it is a peninsula might make it an ideal and easily fortified base for further operations against both Kyushu and Honshu. Thus was born the initial planning for Operation Longbow, the invasion of Yamaguchi and the beginning of the conquest of mainland Japan.

For their part the Japanese have little dreamed that the Allies would attempt an invasion there. Such an effort would involve many difficulties and a great deal of risk. Thus they have turned attention to defenses elsewhere and are taken completely by surprise when American Marine and Army divisions begin to pour ashore against almost no opposition on the morning of June 8.

The invasion strikes both at wide sandy beaches just north of Shimoneseki and at Fukawa Bay itself. By the end of the day both locations are secure and American forces are driving inland to link up and secure vital road junctions at Ozuki and Nishiichi. Speed and surprise have brought the Allied forces early success.

But while there is no organized resistance there are several incidents that foreshadow the human tragedy of Yamaguchi. In most places the civilian population, quickly overrun and conditioned to obedience, cowers in their homes. But here and there, inland, the civilians fight back, in many cases wielding nothing more formidable than spears. They are mowed down by the hundreds. It is only a hint of what is to come.

---

Fukawa Bay and vicinity, map circa 1945 – 1950:



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SireChaos
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RE: Assault on mainland Japan: Operation Longbow

Post by SireChaos »

Oh. There it is. I was confused about your hint for Fukawa Bay when I could find it neither in Wikipedia nor on Google Earth.
 
Hint for others using Google Earth: do not search for "Fukawa". If you look at the southern end of Honshu, more or less opposite Hiroshima, and zoom in, you should notice an island off the coast - that´s Omijima. The area has changed quite a bit since that map was made.
Dave3L
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RE: Assault on mainland Japan: Operation Longbow

Post by Dave3L »

CF,

The Army of the Potomac was commanded at Gettysburg by George Meade, not McClellan. But your point about not being about at The Moment still rings true.
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RE: Assault on mainland Japan: Operation Longbow

Post by Cuttlefish »

ORIGINAL: Dave3L

CF,

The Army of the Potomac was commanded at Gettysburg by George Meade, not McClellan. But your point about not being about at The Moment still rings true.


Crud. I knew that. I just didn't write that.

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Alikchi2
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RE: Assault on mainland Japan: Operation Longbow

Post by Alikchi2 »

Oh, God, I don't like this. Longbow is going to be a nasty word for military historians, isn't it? You're the master of ominous foreshadowing, sir.

It's an invasion of mainland Japan. What option does the IJN have but to throw everything at it?


Quick link to a map showing Yamaguchi prefecture relative to the rest of Japan -

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Map_o ... ecture.svg
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Capt. Harlock
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RE: Assault on mainland Japan: Operation Longbow

Post by Capt. Harlock »

Thus they have turned attention to defenses elsewhere and are taken completely by surprise when American Marine and Army divisions begin to pour ashore against almost no opposition on the morning of June 8.

Wow -- the Allies haven't got a fully working airfield on Tsushima Island yet, and they're doing this? (And does the game really report civilian casualties during fighting on mainland Japan? I think this is the first AAR I've read with an actual invasion on Honshu.)
Civil war? What does that mean? Is there any foreign war? Isn't every war fought between men, between brothers?

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kaleun
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RE: Assault on mainland Japan: Operation Longbow

Post by kaleun »

Poetic license my friend, poetic license.
Appear at places to which he must hasten; move swiftly where he does not expect you.
Sun Tzu
Cuttlefish
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RE: Assault on mainland Japan: Operation Longbow

Post by Cuttlefish »

June 9, 1945

Location: 150 miles northwest of Sapporo
Course: Southwest
Attached to: TF 21
Mission: Surface combat
System Damage: 5
Float Damage: 0
Fires: 0
Fuel: 346

Orders: Return to Wakkanai

---

Shiro is alone in the forward 25mm gun tub. Beside him the guns are only a shape beneath their canvas covering. The cover is stitched and patched; replacements are hard to come by as even canvas is in short supply these days. Shiro is holding a pair of binoculars and peering through them as he slowly and methodically sweeps his field of vision back and forth, scanning the sea and sky ahead of the ship.

Patient and methodical, Shiro has an ideal temperament for a lookout. He knows there are other lookouts on duty aboard Hibiki, more lookouts on the other twenty ships in the task force, and that most of the ships are equipped with radar as well. But he plays a mental game with himself, telling himself that he is the only lookout in the task force and that everything depends on him staying alert.

And there may well be danger out there. Right now the task force is cruising near the Soviet coast, hoping to work its way undetected across the Sea of Japan to within strike range of the American invasion beaches. The enemy will surely be watching for such a move and will seek to prevent it.

The Allied invasion of Yamaguchi has come as a surprise to every man in the crew, and as a shock. Shiro, while more phlegmatic than many of his shipmates, finds himself filled with determination to do his duty to the utmost, to do whatever it takes to drive the enemy from the shores of Japan. He has no illusions about the fate of any Japanese ship that accepts battle with the enemy fleet at this point, but that does not matter. What matters is striking an effective blow before the end.

His vigilance does not waver while he thinks these things and as he trains his binoculars back to the southwest he imagines he sees a speck against the unbroken blue of the cloudless sky. He moves his gaze back to try and pick it up again and at first fails. Perhaps he imagined it.

No, there it is again. He holds the binoculars rock-steady and as he watches becomes sure it is an airplane. Without moving he calls out his observation and hears it relayed up to the bridge above and behind him. Others are soon looking, some using the big 12 cm model 5 binoculars mounted on the observation platforms.

It is an enemy plane. When it is close enough Shiro has no trouble identifying it as a type PBY. That it has seen them cannot be doubted. It declines to approach closely but instead banks away to the south and is presently lost to view.

Shiro is disappointed, but not surprised, when half an hour later the task force turns around and heads back towards Wakkanai. It is imperative that Japan’s last major surface force strikes a telling blow and this cannot happen if they are sunk by enemy carrier planes halfway to their destination.

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Capt. Harlock
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RE: Assault on mainland Japan: Operation Longbow

Post by Capt. Harlock »

Shiro is disappointed, but not surprised, when half an hour later the task force turns around and heads back towards Wakkanai. It is imperative that Japan’s last major surface force strikes a telling blow and this cannot happen if they are sunk by enemy carrier planes halfway to their destination.

Hibiki's torpedoes are rusting in their tubes . . .
Civil war? What does that mean? Is there any foreign war? Isn't every war fought between men, between brothers?

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Dave3L
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RE: Assault on mainland Japan: Operation Longbow

Post by Dave3L »

ORIGINAL: Capt. Harlock


Hibiki's torpedoes are rusting in their tubes . . .

Like Lt. Sugiyura would let THAT happen.
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RE: Assault on mainland Japan: Operation Longbow

Post by Cuttlefish »

ORIGINAL: Capt. Harlock

Wow -- the Allies haven't got a fully working airfield on Tsushima Island yet, and they're doing this? (And does the game really report civilian casualties during fighting on mainland Japan? I think this is the first AAR I've read with an actual invasion on Honshu.)

I don't think many Japanese players have had the, um, pleasure of trying to repel an Allied assault on Honshu. I don't know whether to be proud or appalled to be in that select group.
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