Dutch air force

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Jorge_Stanbury
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Dutch air force

Post by Jorge_Stanbury »

Is there any way of using Dutch airplanes once Java/ Dei fall ?
I am not a fan of the KNIL Buffalos / B-10 but those Dutch catalinas can be useful.

margeorg
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RE: Dutch air force

Post by margeorg »

Buy out the Catalina groups and fly them out, or disband them. The dutch Catalina production lasts for a very long time into the war, and those groups are a much needed addition to your patrol force. I use them in the India theater, where supply with british Catalinas is mediocre at best. It´s November 1942 now in my current PBEM, and I still have 7 dutch Catalina groups operating with 3 planes each.

BTW, do the same with Do-24 Wal groups. They can convert to Catalinas when the Dorniers are used up (in case you´re playing with PDU on).
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RE: Dutch air force

Post by Jorge_Stanbury »

How can they be bought? I see them all restricted (white)
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Bullwinkle58
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RE: Dutch air force

Post by Bullwinkle58 »

I believe some people buy out Darwin base to ABDA HQ and fly the Dutch air force there to safety. Never tried it myself.
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RE: Dutch air force

Post by btd64 »

I think it's a little gamey,but, Withdraw the dutch air units before the major dutch bases fall. In about 60 to 90 days they reappear in Aden. I do this in AI games. Also some of the Dutch fighter squadrons upgrade to P40E's and Hurricanes. And bomber squadrons to B25's....GP
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RE: Dutch air force

Post by btd64 »

ORIGINAL: Bullwinkle58

I believe some people buy out Darwin base to ABDA HQ and fly the Dutch air force there to safety. Never tried it myself.
The one Transport group the Dutch have will do it....GP
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RE: Dutch air force

Post by Bullwinkle58 »

ORIGINAL: General Patton

ORIGINAL: Bullwinkle58

I believe some people buy out Darwin base to ABDA HQ and fly the Dutch air force there to safety. Never tried it myself.
The one Transport group the Dutch have will do it....GP

Not sure what you mean here.
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RE: Dutch air force

Post by btd64 »

ORIGINAL: Bullwinkle58

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ORIGINAL: Bullwinkle58

I believe some people buy out Darwin base to ABDA HQ and fly the Dutch air force there to safety. Never tried it myself.
The one Transport group the Dutch have will do it....GP

Not sure what you mean here.

Oh, Your talking about the Darwin base Command to ABDA. instead of OZ restricted. Interesting idea....GP
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RE: Dutch air force

Post by wegman58 »

For want of having them destroyed, once my Dutch squadrons were nothing but grounded planes I withdrew them. Lo and behold I have a parade of UNRESTRICTED squadrons showing up in Aden. Had no idea that was going to happen - I was thinking of buying some back if and when I had a toe hold in the Dutch East Indies in the later part of the game.

No (or few) planes, but you can flesh them out. Some are ready to upgrade to P-40 and B25, which are in the pools.
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RE: Dutch air force

Post by Bullwinkle58 »

ORIGINAL: General Patton

ORIGINAL: Bullwinkle58

ORIGINAL: General Patton



The one Transport group the Dutch have will do it....GP

Not sure what you mean here.

Oh, Your talking about the Darwin base Command to ABDA. instead of OZ restricted. Interesting idea....GP

Yep. Far East Command (ABDA). Pay once, change the flag, fly the whole Dutch air force out whenever it needs to get out. Might need to watch transfer ranges if you wait too long, but most of it can come in pretty late.

I think the HQ buy-out is about 600 PP. Can do it on Dec. 8th if the scenario has a PP pool. Or wait and save up.
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RE: Dutch air force

Post by Bullwinkle58 »

ORIGINAL: wegman58

For want of having them destroyed, once my Dutch squadrons were nothing but grounded planes I withdrew them. Lo and behold I have a parade of UNRESTRICTED squadrons showing up in Aden. Had no idea that was going to happen - I was thinking of buying some back if and when I had a toe hold in the Dutch East Indies in the later part of the game.

No (or few) planes, but you can flesh them out. Some are ready to upgrade to P-40 and B25, which are in the pools.

In Dec. 1942 I have a dozen air groups in Aden from this very tactic. But I find there aren't enough pilots left in the Dutch pools, or the available planes aren't enough to matter either way for use in Burma/India. I just put them on training and forgot about them pretty much.
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RE: Dutch air force

Post by btd64 »

ORIGINAL: Bullwinkle58

ORIGINAL: General Patton

ORIGINAL: Bullwinkle58




Not sure what you mean here.

Oh, Your talking about the Darwin base Command to ABDA. instead of OZ restricted. Interesting idea....GP

Yep. Far East Command (ABDA). Pay once, change the flag, fly the whole Dutch air force out whenever it needs to get out. Might need to watch transfer ranges if you wait too long, but most of it can come in pretty late.

I like it. Much easier and you don't have to transport them back into the theater from Aden....GP
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RE: Dutch air force

Post by crsutton »

ORIGINAL: wegman58

For want of having them destroyed, once my Dutch squadrons were nothing but grounded planes I withdrew them. Lo and behold I have a parade of UNRESTRICTED squadrons showing up in Aden. Had no idea that was going to happen - I was thinking of buying some back if and when I had a toe hold in the Dutch East Indies in the later part of the game.

No (or few) planes, but you can flesh them out. Some are ready to upgrade to P-40 and B25, which are in the pools.


The problem is there are no replacements beyond the stock that you have on hand so it does not necessarily pay to reactivate all of them. There is a RAAF squadron that can use the B25s and it hold 18 planes. But you cannot use anything else for it until the Mitchell III comes on line in 1944. Likewise there is an American squadron that can use the Dutch B25 and the A20 but once again will burn through them. You also eventually get a Dutch fighter squadron in OZ that can only use the old Dutch fighters until they upgrade to the Mustang in 1945. So if you are fighting for India you might use the Dutch squadrons but if the fight is in the Pacific you might op to reserve the planes for the units already there than can put them to use. One good use is to bring back the Dutch bomber formations and equip them with the old B10 and then train them up for ASW work. They are useful for this and might last throughout the war this way. Plus they have a nice 300kg bomb.
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Jorge_Stanbury
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RE: Dutch air force

Post by Jorge_Stanbury »

Thanks for the great advice!

I think the "Darwin" option is too ahistorical for my taste. I will keep using them KNIL squadrons until I am beaten, then withdraw and see if I have enough pilots/ planes to reactivate.

Great idea the B-10 as ASW; I also notice there is a Dutch "RAF" 6-plane Catalina squadron on the queue, so some of the survivors can be used as pool/ replacements.

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RE: Dutch air force

Post by jcjordan »

There are 4 dutch units that come back for the Allies- 3 RAAF & 1 RAF unit. The RAAF units are 1 fighter, 1 bomber & 1 transport. The RAF unit is a Cat (uses Brit Cat not Dutch)unit. The Cat (No3XX RAF)& bomber unit (No18 RAAF) come spring/summer 42 but the fighter & transport are late war in 44/45. I've not really had a problem on Dutch running out of pilots even though they don't get any replacements but only problem has been the lack of a/c while they're still fighting in Java 41/42 so end up disbanding some to keep some units viable while moving RAF/RAAF/USAAF groups in to bolster. I try to save as many of the Dutch B25's to help the US unit that uses them until it upgrades to US B25D IIRC depending on PDU on or off. The Dutch bomber unit I'll normally upgrade from the Dutch B25 to Mitchell II. Only other unit that uses the Mitchell II is a RAAF unit so I pass it through to Aussie Beafort as soon as I can so as to let the Dutch unit fill w/ the Mitchells. When it comes time for the fighter & transport the Allies normally don't have a lack of a/c problem.
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RE: Dutch air force

Post by wneumann »

You do get all the Dutch squadrons back in Aden (can't remember exactly when I did). Crsutton and Bullwinkle both pretty accurately describe the circumstances under which they come back. The only available Dutch pilots and planes are what's in the pools - nowhere near enough to equip all Dutch air units and in any event, the planes have little if any value in most front-line air operations. Margeorg stated a good point that also coincided with what I did. First priority of re-activating Dutch air squadrons should be the small patrol (naval search) air units. Both PBY Catalinas and some Do-24 planes exist in sufficient numbers to equip most if not all of these squadrons. I'm operating several Dutch RAAF Mitchell II 2E bomber units over New Guinea in my PBEM but pilot and plane attrition in these squadrons has to be very closely watched - you run out of either replacement planes or pilots, these air units are pretty much out of action permanently. In general, Dutch air units returning to the game can afford to have very little attrition of pilots or planes, losses of either pilots or planes basically irreplaceable.
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RE: Dutch air force

Post by wdolson »

ORIGINAL: Jorge_Stanbury

Thanks for the great advice!

I think the "Darwin" option is too ahistorical for my taste. I will keep using them KNIL squadrons until I am beaten, then withdraw and see if I have enough pilots/ planes to reactivate.

Great idea the B-10 as ASW; I also notice there is a Dutch "RAF" 6-plane Catalina squadron on the queue, so some of the survivors can be used as pool/ replacements.


When Java fell there were a number of dutch aircraft that were evacuated to Broome and many were destroyed when the Japanese raided Darwin and Broome. Most of the aircraft were flying boats. I believe the survivors were taken over by the RAAF.

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RE: Dutch air force

Post by btd64 »

ORIGINAL: wneumann

You do get all the Dutch squadrons back in Aden (can't remember exactly when I did). Crsutton and Bullwinkle both pretty accurately describe the circumstances under which they come back. The only available Dutch pilots and planes are what's in the pools - nowhere near enough to equip all Dutch air units and in any event, the planes have little if any value in most front-line air operations. Margeorg stated a good point that also coincided with what I did. First priority of re-activating Dutch air squadrons should be the small patrol (naval search) air units. Both PBY Catalinas and some Do-24 planes exist in sufficient numbers to equip most if not all of these squadrons. I'm operating several Dutch RAAF Mitchell II 2E bomber units over New Guinea in my PBEM but pilot and plane attrition in these squadrons has to be very closely watched - you run out of either replacement planes or pilots, these air units are pretty much out of action permanently. In general, Dutch air units returning to the game can afford to have very little attrition of pilots or planes, losses of either pilots or planes basically irreplaceable.

I will save as many as possible, and then thin the herd down to a few squadrons with the other planes and pilots in the pool. That way I have them for a little while anyway....GP
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RE: Dutch air force

Post by wegman58 »

ORIGINAL: crsutton

ORIGINAL: wegman58

For want of having them destroyed, once my Dutch squadrons were nothing but grounded planes I withdrew them. Lo and behold I have a parade of UNRESTRICTED squadrons showing up in Aden. Had no idea that was going to happen - I was thinking of buying some back if and when I had a toe hold in the Dutch East Indies in the later part of the game.

No (or few) planes, but you can flesh them out. Some are ready to upgrade to P-40 and B25, which are in the pools.


The problem is there are no replacements beyond the stock that you have on hand so it does not necessarily pay to reactivate all of them. There is a RAAF squadron that can use the B25s and it hold 18 planes. But you cannot use anything else for it until the Mitchell III comes on line in 1944. Likewise there is an American squadron that can use the Dutch B25 and the A20 but once again will burn through them. You also eventually get a Dutch fighter squadron in OZ that can only use the old Dutch fighters until they upgrade to the Mustang in 1945. So if you are fighting for India you might use the Dutch squadrons but if the fight is in the Pacific you might op to reserve the planes for the units already there than can put them to use. One good use is to bring back the Dutch bomber formations and equip them with the old B10 and then train them up for ASW work. They are useful for this and might last throughout the war this way. Plus they have a nice 300kg bomb.

The odd thing was (latest patch, Scenario 8 (?) - Quiet China, Dec 8) I did NOT have to pay for them. I withdrew and whatever the time lapse is Aden is floating in Dutch squadrons. No buy back required.
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RE: Dutch air force

Post by CaseLogic »

You don't really have to buy out Darwin to sir robin the Dutch AF in an AI game. Holding on to Saumlaki north of Darwin isn't too hard if you buy out a few Dutch garrison BNs (or ferry them out with the penny packet Catalina squadrons). Get an airfield built and you can transfer there. I augmented it with two USAAF and a USN base force out of the PI.
It'll be horribly overstacked untill you have the airfield up to 8 and an airHQ in place, but they'll live.
If the Japanese try an invasion of Saumlaki they can be wrecked in one turn by CLs out of Darwin at full speed.
For added nastiness buy out an RAA coastal arty unit and station there, and put an aussie air HQ and some Beuforts there when available.

An AD in Saumlaki makes a great Fletcher base in 43 where you can raid underescorted supply convoys in a large radius and also draw in Japanese bombers to a Saumlaki CAP-trap (Aussie spitfire VIIIs really chew them up).
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