Keynes' Cruisers Volume 2

Status
Not open for further replies.
Reader mode
Driftless

Driftless

Donor
mudhead said:
Not sure about avgas supplies on Bataan. They have diesel, shipped in, but I don't think there's been any mention of any other fuel.
Click to expand...

I'd guess that any flights in and out are going to be irregular and only for very high priority, low weight cargoes, so avgas may get there in small volumes on the Gay Corsair type circuit, or similar. It's more a mark of how the options are starting to shift.
 

Butchpfd

Driftless said:
That's also within one-way range of Bataan for a loaded PBY, and maybe a round-trip, if lightly loaded
Click to expand...

formion said:
Could a Martin M-130 flying boat be used to move some supplies to Bataan or it would be too precious an asset to be risked in such manner ?
Click to expand...

PBM Mariner has a 500 mile longer range then a PBY Catalina.. another alternative is is bring in one of the Pan AM Clippers, they had a range of 3600 miles, 3300 wit full load of pass and cargo
 
Story 1916
  • Index

    • fester

    Baku, February 20, 1943

    The foreman's whistle blew. The crew changed out. Roughnecks had been on the rig for sixteen hours straight. The wobble had been stabilized and more oil was being extracted from the ground. Once it came to the surface, a rat's nest of pipes lead to the distribution center. Barges and trains were ready to take today's haul to refineries. From there, gasoline and diesel and asphalt and everything else that a modern economy needed would be created from the thick crude.

    Ten miles away, the anti-aircraft center hummed with activity. Radar screens were glowing green. Nothing threatening was seen coming from the north. Another dozen large transport planes were crossing the Persian border now. They had critical supplies that the Southwest and Caucasus Fronts needed. Cold men and frigid women manned the guns that protected the oil complex. They waited and stomped their feet to keep the cold at bay.
     
  • Index

    • Errolwi

    Monthly Donor
    fester said:
    Nope, not going to make the logistics that easy
    Click to expand...

    BTW, the OTL NZ Article XV squadron in Singapore did have RNZAF groundcrew when formed in October 1941, unlike the European squadrons. There were also a least another couple of squadrons worth of NZ aircrew in the Far East, I expect many of them would have been recruited into the RAF pre-war, rather than being E.A.T.S. graduates.
    Just how much of a detour did the ships carrying reinforcements have to take between Fremantle and Singapore ITTL?
     
    Story 1917
  • Index

    • fester


    Rjukan, Norway, February 22, 1943


    Thirteen men were on skis. All were wearing British uniforms although few could have ordered a cuppa properly. Heavy packs weighed down on them. Submachine guns so slung on half the men, two pairs carried light machine guns while the remaining men hand well sighted rifles. Legs pumped, arms moved, and lungs worked in the frigid air.


    Another mile to the cluster of pine trees with slightly blue needles. Another small hill to climb, another moment to relax and take in the moment of joy of accelerating. For a second, the leader forgot about the dozen commandos behind him and allowed himself to be seven years old as he tucked into the wind and went as fast as he could. Gravity was freedom and joy and a rest.


    At the pine trees, the teams split. The explosive men, one sniper, two machine gunners and three boom men headed to the east. Two hundred miles to the Swedish border. The half dozen men took a swig from their canteen and ate a small bar of American chocolate. Calories were better than overly sweetened child’s candy, but the fuel would be burned quickly. Legs started to churn and those six men would make their way to Sweden over the next five days.


    The rest of the men waited half an hour. Two pairs headed south and the last trio, including the commander, headed north. They were the decoys and deceptions. Two or three men could lead any German pursuit on a merry journey across glaciers and up and down fjords for a week or more. Their lives were only worth time. Skis started to swish across the snow as the successful saboteurs took off again.
     
    Last edited:
  • Index
    • Story 1918
  • Index

    • fester

    Warsaw, February 23, 1943

    Any other city, any other neighborhood, would have had its air thick with smoke. Smoke coming from chimneys, smoke coming from factories, smoke coming from street corner barrels ablaze. The chill was bone cutting.

    No fuel was available in the ghetto. Several dozen elders had passed overnight. Clothes were being redistributed and a few people had heavier layers on this morning to keep out the cold. Completely inadequate rations were slightly more adequate for dozens of young men and young women. They huddled in basements. Most were fingering homemade weapons. Explosives and simple weapons built in basement workshops based on the plans for the British Sten guns were sourced from within the ghetto. A few smugglers had traded military grade rifles and grenades for gold and many other things that could have been used to feed starving children for another week or two.

    Squad and group leaders whispered. Plans were refreshed and updated as observers noted where the German and government patrols and check points were. No attacks were scheduled to happen yet, more time would be needed. Almost every guerrilla knew that they would not be able to win the battle that they were preparing for, but they knew that they had at least a choice for their life and their death, a choice that their cousins and sisters and brothers in the other ghettos that had been cleared never had. They listened to the counsel of patience, patience for a few more days, patience for a little more preparation. They could wait just a little longer.
     
  • Index
    • Story 1919
  • Index

    • fester


    Southern France February 23, 1943

    A tiny wisp of wind brushed against his cheek like his lover’s fingers in the morning light. His eyes narrowed and his world collapsed like when he lowered himself into her during a lazy morning. She had been his world and he had been hers in the last few months of peace. Now she was gone, and the world around him was the end of a rifle barrel and a steel bump that stayed tight within a circle. The sight picture was firmly centered on a bumbling sergeant in an Adrian helmet who was trying to chivy an inexperienced dozen militia men through the scrub land.

    He held his rifle loosely and waited. He could hear the breaths of his veterans wait through the infinity. Shoulders slightly moved, toes curled and then relaxed as blood had to keep flowing to feet. Suddenly, a single light machine gun and a trio of Bren guns whose barrels were wrapped in heavy cloth burst. It sounded like a full company of infantry had the drop on the fascist patrol.

    He ignored the chaos, it was his friend as his rifle kicked into his shoulder. He worked the bolt and then fired another shot, and then one more. Three was enough. He rolled away from the smoke that marked his position. By now, if he was on the other end of the ambush, he would have either been dead or firing up the hill while searching for bounding cover. The ambushed militiamen were too confused to react well. Some were still standing. The single machine gun shifted from suppression to killing mode. Others had dropped to the ground where they were and were scrambling to get their rifles ready. A few of the smartest men were using the bodies of their dead and dying comrades as cover. Supersonic steel thudded into flesh that was already unmoving protecting them.

    Grenades started to come down the hill. Teams of men, three or four at a time, began to advance. Fire a few shots and then scramble a few steps. Explosions forced the ambushed patrol to the ground, buying gaps in the slowly increasing return fire for the maneuver groups to close and destroy the enemy. Soon rifles were too clumsy for this work. Grenades and pistols and submachine guns supplemented knives and clubs. Within minutes, the few wounded guerrillas were being treated with carefully hoarded medicine or mercy strokes while the dead and dying fascists were being looted for intelligence and weapons.

    Jacques d’Orlong took long purposeful strides until he found good cover. He settled down in overwatch and waited for the scavenging to be completed.
     
    Last edited:
  • Index
    • Story 1920
  • Index

    • fester


    Northern Bosnia February 24, 1943

    Earlier that morning, a bomb detonated.

    Someone had placed eight pounds of cordite near a sewage drain in the mountain town. It was not just a pile of cordite. No, it was a directed, controlled explosive with four pounds of nails and ball bearings packed on one side and the rest of the explosives sheltered in an eleven millimeter thick steel container. They then ran a command detonation line three hundred yards through the sewers to an abandoned half burned out building. From there, someone had a perfect line of sight into the town square.

    The bomb exploded just as an Italian infantry company marched into town after three days patrolling for partisans. The streets were red with blood and the buildings on the far side of the square were covered in body parts.

    Now, two hundred townspeople were assembled in the town square; the mayor, the iman of the mosque, a trio of doctors and the librarians were among them. They knew that resistance meant more of their families and neighbors would join them. Soon machine guns started to fire, and their blood joined that of the dead Italian soldiers blood that already marred the sewers.
     
    Last edited:
  • Index
    • Story 1921
  • Index

    • fester


    Rabaul, February 25, 1943


    Air raid sirens were going off. Half a dozen Zeroes were already in the sky for the morning patrol as Australian and American raiders from Lae, Port Moresby and Guadalcanal liked to strike just after dawn. Another four were warming up to escort two dozen Nell bombers to hit Tulagi. Pilots were scrambling to their aircraft even as grounds crews sought to get the engines started. Even as the airfield was beautiful chaos, the radar operators called out more information.

    The raid was coming from the northeast and a second raid was right behind it. The follow-on strike was coming in fast and low. This was not a typical raid of a squadron of twin engine medium bombers.


    Instead three aircraft carriers had launched their Sunday punch. USS Essex had her entire airwing except for twelve Wildcats in the air while Enterprise and Yorktown each had over sixty aircraft heading towards Rabaul. A dozen fighters from each carrier was ten minutes ahead of the main package where another section of fighters closely protected the bombers. Veteran element and section leaders reminded their green replacement pilots to hold tight and to stay off the radio. Gunners scanned the sky. Some had flown into the heart of the Kido Butai while others had never been challenged.

    Even as the eleventh Zero left the ground, Enterprise’s leading edge dove into the standing patrol. The Wildcats had height, they had speed and they had numbers. They also had flight time. Even the rawest pilot had over four hundred hours in the air and every man had at least sixty five hours in the past forty five days. Their opponents were lucky to get an hour a day as fuel was scarce in this outpost of the Empire. The Japanese pre-war pilots were thousand hour men and their training was embedded into their fingertips without needing thought, but reflexes that had been honed through constant practice were arthritic.

    Thirty three American fighters survived the first clash. They now owned the air above Rabaul. Only anti-aircraft shells could contest the space. A foolhardy man tried to take off in one last Zero. He was bounced by a quartet of Wildcats before he could clear five hundred feet of altitude.

    Soon almost two hundred strikers arrived. Yorktown and Essex took the harbor while Enterprise’s bomber’s hit the airfields. Torpedoes entered the water and bombs punched through thin steel decks. An hour later, a dozen ships were sinking; another three had turtled. Three dozen bombers were burning in the jungle lined airstrips. Rabaul was no longer a worry for the few Marines garrisoning Guadalcanal and Tulagi.

    Third Fleet turned to the south and continued on their journey. Essex was no longer raw.
     
  • Index

    • sloreck

    OTL the signal for the Warsaw rising was when the Germans began a serious attempt to liquidate the ghetto by sending the inhabitants to the death camps (basically Treblinka). Sadly I imagine, ITTL like OTL, the Polish Home Army will not even give passive support.
     
    Reader mode
    Top
    Status
    Not open for further replies.
    Top