Keynes' Cruisers

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Logan2879

Logan2879

fester said:
Chicago May 31, 1942

A dozen workmen looked at the blueprints. No one had any idea why it was so important for a racquetball court to be knocked down underneath the University of Chicago’s abandoned football field, but none of the men were questioning the double time on a Sunday. Soon sledge hammers were knocking out a wall while other men were bringing steel in from the loading dock to build a reinforced floor. The nerds wanted something that could handle a very large and dense machine, and as long as the checks cleared, the laborers could build anything that was desired.



End of Volume 3
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@fester missing a threadmark
 
AlanJWhite

AlanJWhite

fester said:
The work order for grabbing the space is all that is happening. There has not been any order for graphite or anything else.
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It was the other way round ... material for the Fermi Pile was collected first ... intended to be built at a US Army controlled site in the Argonne Forest.
But that building was delayed by an industrial dispute and in early November, Fermi came to Compton with a proposal to build the experimental pile under the stands at Stagg Field.

(FYI Fermi's pile was NOT the first try at this technique. At least 16 others had been tried including one in the famous sports court by Sam Allison. Fermi's design was both larger and more sophisticated and the first to achieve a k > 1 )
 

King Augeas

fester said:
Murmansk, May 30 1942

Sea birds swooped low, beaks open and eyes searching for the stream of garbage and food that trailed merchant ships making anchor. Thirty seven cargo vessels had arrived over the past twelve hours in three waves. Four ships had been lost, three to submarines and one to a mine. Most of the escort including the overworked escort carrier Audacity had been directed to dock in Archanglesk as the quays and docks off Murmansk were overwhelmed.

Cranes were soon hauling crates and bundles out of holds while pipes and hoses drained tankers of their cargo. Waiting trains were ready to bring the hundreds of tanks and guns south to the armies that needed to be rebuilt yet again.
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No losses to aircraft, then. Did the Luftwaffe even try?
 

Draconis

fester said:
Tarakan, Borneo May 28, 1942

As the tide was heading in, six fully laden tankers slowly made their way out to sea where an armed merchant cruiser and a trio of destroyers awaited them. The escorts would take them to Palawan and then the destroyers would return to the southern waters for combat operations. These six tankers were destined for the refineries of the Home Islands while the destroyers would refill their bunkers from the storage tanks holding some of the sweetest and cleanest crude oil in the world. Over the long run, unrefined fuel would destroy the engines, but the destroyers would either be sunk or Japan would be victorious before that was a concern.T
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Where's McPherson's Mackerels when they're needed?
 

Unknown

Can't wait for the next volume, @fester...

Your mentioning of the Polish forces in exile on many occasions makes me think that it's a Chekov's Gun for later in the war (circa, oh, 1944; don't know why I think that, but I do)...

Waiting for more, of course...
 
Driftless

Driftless

Donor
Unknown said:
Can't wait for the next volume, @fester...

Your mentioning of the Polish forces in exile on many occasions makes me think that it's a Chekov's Gun for later in the war (circa, oh, 1944; don't know why I think that, but I do)...

Waiting for more, of course...
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I have to admit, I've not heard the term "Chekov's Gun", so I had to look it up. Kind of an antithesis to a "Red Herring"

Thanks for expanding my horizon...:cool:

(To your point - I'd bet the Pole's have a significant role to play yet. Historically very brave and skilled warriors.)
 

fester

Driftless said:
I have to admit, I've not heard the term "Chekov's Gun", so I had to look it up. Kind of an antithesis to a "Red Herring"

Thanks for expanding my horizon...:cool:

(To your point - I'd bet the Pole's have a significant role to play yet. Historically very brave and skilled warriors.)
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I have no idea what role the Poles will play.

I needed a tank reserve in the UK after Dunkirk to enable a far more aggressive initial North Africa campaign. My solution was to get the Free Poles to buy but not have delivered yet enough US tanks to equip an armored Division that could be fully ready on the Salisbury Plain by July 1940.

After that ????...
 

Major Major

fester said:
I have no idea what role the Poles will play.

I needed a tank reserve in the UK after Dunkirk to enable a far more aggressive initial North Africa campaign. My solution was to get the Free Poles to buy but not have delivered yet enough US tanks to equip an armored Division that could be fully ready on the Salisbury Plain by July 1940.

After that ????...
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"Trzy salwy na cześć Polski!" ["Three salvos in honor of Poland!"]

Followed by three time-on-target salvos on German positions from every gun in the division.

1st_Polish_Armoured_Division.jpg
 

Tjyorksgeezer

fester said:
Tarakan, Borneo May 28, 1942

As the tide was heading in, six fully laden tankers slowly made their way out to sea where an armed merchant cruiser and a trio of destroyers awaited them. The escorts would take them to Palawan and then the destroyers would return to the southern waters for combat operations. These six tankers were destined for the refineries of the Home Islands while the destroyers would refill their bunkers from the storage tanks holding some of the sweetest and cleanest crude oil in the world. Over the long run, unrefined fuel would destroy the engines, but the destroyers would either be sunk or Japan would be victorious before that was a concern.

Throughout the day a float plane loitered overhead searching for pesky Allied submarines and stayed with the large, slow, vulnerable valuable tanks until darkness fell.
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The unrefined oil will steadily damage the boilers, clogging the burners, reducing top speed, making these destroyers "smoke" more, less performance, more easily detected.
 

fester

Tjyorksgeezer said:
The unrefined oil will steadily damage the boilers, clogging the burners, reducing top speed, making these destroyers "smoke" more, less performance, more easily detected.
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yep, and the estimate is that the war will be won or the destroyers will be sunk before that matters.
 

Viper91

fester said:
I took the past week off not even thinking about the story. Plotting and writing will resume tomorrow
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No worries, you've been going at this pretty relentlessly over the last year or so. If you need to take time off to plan stuff out, or take a break to focus on other things or Real Life stuff, do what you have to do or need to do.
 
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