Ranger-75
Posts: 610
Joined: 6/29/2001
From: Giant sand box
Status: offline
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Hi, People see my posts and I'll bet they often think, who is this guy to say this or that was logistically or politically not possible, etc?
Well, I don't know what everyone else's background is, but in addition to being IT pro (never programmed a game though) I've been a logistician for nearly 30 years and a historian for over 37. When i dived into PacWar back in the late 90s early 2000s, i thought, OK, finally a game that pays some attention to logistics and supply concerns. But that was not to be. While there is a requirement and consumption of supplies that is pretty good, the way the game handles re-supply is well, interesting.
I'm sure many have already looked at this, but just look at the map, It's some 2,400 miles from SF to Pearl, a Carrier TF can barely make it there in 1 week, but a 10 knot MCS plodding along will take over 10 days one way, LA to Sydney is over 6,000 miles, Japan to Java or Sumatra , some 3,400 miles. anywhere from 12-30 days one way.
Yet the routine convoys can resupply these bases and ones further away in 1 week round trip! Yeah tell me about that. It makes Get transport a little less fantasy based when you consider this. If everyone had to use hand built convoys, they would get a better idea of how logistically strained the Japanese merchant fleet really was especially as it occupied bases all over the SW Pacific. While the US and British had much more ample shipping fleets, they would also feel the pinch, especially on the long routes to Australia where a convoy would take about 4 weeks or more to make a round trip.
So, what am I getting at? Simple I don't mind having fun with the game, but I really don't condone gaming the game to make what was clearly an impossibility a preferred COA for either side.
Let's look at just two items in the real world and translate them to PACWAR game terms if we can.
Fuel - in the mideast for the two campaigns the US has been conducting here (I'm "here" now):
We were using, at the peak, over 2 million gallons of fuel per day in Iraq / Kuwait for ground forces alone, when adding in afghan and the smaller gulf states and air and naval operations this went over 5 million gallons per day. That was to support approx 4 divisions a couple hundred aircraft and 1-2 CBGs. Probably 3 port bases with 2-3 further land paths in PACWAR terms. Now granted, we did not have to transport this all over the ocean, the source was right there, but the consumption was indeed there.
5 million gallons is approx three WW2 era Fleet Oilers (AOs). In a PACWAR game-week that's 21-25 AOs needed just to keep the fuel level from dropping to supply 3 ports and their subsequent inland bases, with a 7 to 15 day one way travel time, this means 50-80 AOs (or TKs) are needed just to keep these three bases supplied. Does the IJN (or even the US / Brits) have this many AO (and TKs) floating around. No they don't.
And that's just fuel (no ammo food, etc) for only a 3 port cluster supporting 4 divisions.
Look at food. We had over 200,000 troops at the peak, (actually close to 250,000 with the navy personnel) plus an almost equal number of US civilians and contractors that had to be fed. The dining facilities serve 4 meals per day, making a requirement of some 1.6 million meals per day. I haven't calculated the actual # of short tons that is, but planning factors make that approx, 7,500 short tons per day. That is a medium MCS every day or 7 per week just for the food. Ammunition is a similar load, and that's scheduled (not based on demand), but 1 more ship for that (and construction material which was in high demand all along), and you have a 14 MCS requirement per week. Again with travel times this would tie up between 30-45 MCS just for these 3 posts and their onward bases.
To attack Hawai'i would have required at this much of a force level, assuming that the IJA would consent to diverting the troops from other operations which they would not do. That's the political part and I invite anyone who disagrees to read up on the subject.
It was these very heavy requirements that enabled the US to later bypass large garrisons and leave them to basically starve out the rest of the war.
I hope this sheds some light on the severe logistical requirements that the Pacific Campaigns had and how truly impossible it was to make some of these attacks that some players are waxing about. They could not be supported logistically or politically.
Fire away.
< Message edited by Ranger-75 -- 6/29/2013 7:09:32 AM >
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Still playing PacWar (but no so much anymore)...
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